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The Art of Descrying Distance

Defence and Civil Institute of Environmental Medicine, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

How naëve can one experiment be? Imagine asking observers to judge distance -- yes, literally asking them. And in asking them, no visual evoked potentials were measured, and changes in blood flow to the occipital cortex were ignored. But serendipity occurs even to the well-prepared: One's best thought for a new experiment can prove to be one's first unbiased, uncomplicated thought. Here's a cursory review of the events: A number of observers were asked to judge distances between marked posts in a field at night. They made their judgments with the help of night vision goggles (NVGs). At first the observers underestimated the distances on average. Then an experimenter began to correct the observers after each judgment. The observers' judgments of distance became accurate. On average, the observers began to estimate those distances accurately. Is this an incredible story or a difficult one?

Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Vol. 41, No. 3, 511-514 (1999)
DOI: 10.1518/001872099779611076


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