Abstract
In this paper we discuss the role of spatial context in interpreting and understanding actions from the perception of static images. Our proposal is that people use spatial context, which is to say the relations among objects, to infer actions and make predictions about future states even when no physical events are directly perceived. We begin by presenting an overview of relevant theories for action understanding. We then discuss the role of spatial context as a prerequisite for acting as well as for action goal attribution, by presenting and discussing an experimental study. The addressed question is how representation of motion in static images maps onto perception of an action goal. We tested the extent to which action representations attributed to a static stimulus can be changed when the physical relational properties of objects are manipulated. Results show that the goal attribution, considered as a highly informative component for the interpretation of the perceived action, is carried out by a contextual categorization process which takes into account both the objects’ physical and relational properties, and the semantic relationships between them.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Anderson, J.R. The adaptative nature of human categorization. Psychological Review, 98(3), (1991) 409–429.
Bonnet, C. Visual perception in context. Cahiers de Psychologie, 6(2), (1986) 137–155.
Denis, M. Avant-propos. In M. Denis (Ed.), Langage et Cognition Spatiale (pp.9–13). Paris: Masson. (1997).
Gibson, E. Introductory essay: What does infant perception tell us about theories of perception?. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, 13(4), (1987) 515–523.
Gibson, E., & Schmuckler, M. Going somewhere: An ecological and experimental approach to development of mobility. Ecological Psychology, 1, (1989) 3–27.
Gibson, J.J. The perception of the visual world. Boston: Houghton-Mifflin (1950).
Gibson, J.J. The theory of affordance. In R.E. Shaw & J. Brandsford (Eds.) Perceiving, Acting, and Knowing. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Erlbaum (1977).
Gibson, J.J. The ecological approach to visual perception. Boston, Ma.: Houghton-Mifflin (1979).
Hubbard, T.L. How consequences of physical principles influence mental representation: The environmental invariants hypothesis. In P.R. Killeen & W.R. Uttal (Eds.). Fechner Day 99: The end of 20th century psychophysics. Proceedings of the 15th Annual Meeting of the International Society for Psychophysics Tempe, Az: The International Society for Psychophysics (1999) 274–279.
McArthur, L.Z., & Baron, R.M. Toward an ecological theory of social perception. Psychological Review, 90(3), (1983) 215–238.
Neisser, U. Cognitive Psychology, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall (1967).
Piaget, J. La psychogénèse des connaissances et sa signification épistémologique. In M. Piatelli-Palmarini (Ed.). Théories du langage théories de l’apprentissage. Le débat entre Jean Piaget et Noam Chomsky Paris: Seuil (1979) 53–64.
Pomerol, J.-Ch., & Brézillon, P. Dynamic between contextual knowledge and proceduralized context. In V. Akman, P. Bouquet, R. Thomason, R. Young (Eds.). Lectures Notes in Artificial Intelligence, vol. 1688, Modeling and Using Context, New-York: Springer (1999) 284–295.
Pomerol, J-Ch, & Brézillon, P. About some relationships between knowledge and context. In P. Bouquet, L. Serafini, P. Brézillon, M. Benerecetti, F. Castellani (Eds.). Lectures Notes in Artificial Intelligenec vol. 2116, Modelling and Using Context. New-York: Springer. (2001) 461–464.
Schmidt, C. F., Sridharan, N. S, & Goodson, J. L. The plan recognition problem: An intersection of Psychology and Artificial Intelligence. Artificial Intelligence: Special Issue on Applications to the Sciences and Medicine, 11, (1978) 45–83.
Shaw R., & Bransford J. Approach to the problem of knowledge. In R. Shaw, & J. Bransford (Eds.), Perceiving, acting and knowing. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Erlbaum (1977).
Siskind, J. M., Axiomatic support for event perception. Proceedings AAAI-94 Workshop on Integration of Natural Language and Vision Processing, (1994) 153–160.
Siskind, J. M., Grounding language in perception. Artificial Intelligence Review, 8, (1995) 371–391.
Thorrisson, C. Machine Perception af Real-Time Mulimodal Natural Dialogues.in: P. McKevitt (Ed.), Language, Vision & Music. Amsterdam: John Benjamins (in press).
Tijus, C.A. Contextual categorization and cognitive phenomena. In V. Akman, P. Bouquet, R. Thomason, & R.A. Young (Eds.). Lectures Notes in Artificial Intelligenec vol. 2116, Modelling and Using Context. New-York: Springer. (2001) 316–329.
Turner, R. M. Model of explicit context representation and contextual knowledge for intelligent agents. In J.G. Carbonell, & J. Siekmann (Eds), Lectures Notes in Artificial Intelligence, vol. 1688, Modeling and Using Context, New-York: Springer. (1999b) 375–388.
Turner, R.M. Context-mediated behavior for intelligent agent. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, Special issue on Using Context in Applications, 48,3, (1998) 307–330.
Turner, R.M. Context-mediated behavior: An approach to explicitly representing contexts and contextual knowledge for AI applications. Working Notes of the AAAI-99 Workshop on Modeling and Using Context in AI Applications, AAAI Technical Report (1999a).
Turvey, M. T., & Shaw, R. E. The primacy of perceiving: An ecological reformulation of perception for understanding memory. In L. G. Nilsson (Ed.), Perspectives on Memory Research. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Erlbaum (1979).
Turvey, M. T., & Shaw, R.E. Memory (or, knowing) as a matter of specification non representation: Notes towards a different class of machines. In L. S. Cermak & F. I. M. (Eds.), Levels of processing and human memory. Hillsdale, New Jersey: Erlbaum (1978).
Tversky, B. Form and Function. In L. Carlson & E. van der Zee (Eds.) Functional and Spatial Features in Language and Space. Oxford: Oxford University Press (In press).
Von Helmholtz, H. Treatise on physiological optics, Vol. III. J. P. C. Southall (Ed.), New York: Dover (1925).
Zibetti, E. Catégorisation Contextuelle et compréhension d’événements visuellement perçus et interprétés comme des actions. Thèse de Doctorat, Université de Paris 8 (2001).
Zibetti, E., Hamilton, E., & Tijus C.A. The role of Context in Interpreting Perceived Events as Action. In V. Akman, P. Bouquet, R. Thomason, R. Young (Eds.). Lectures Notes in Artificial Intelligence, vol. 1688, Modeling and Using Context, New-York: Springer (1999). 431–441.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2003 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Zibetti, E., Tijus, C. (2003). Perceiving Action from Static Images: The Role of Spatial Context. In: Blackburn, P., Ghidini, C., Turner, R.M., Giunchiglia, F. (eds) Modeling and Using Context. CONTEXT 2003. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 2680. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44958-2_31
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44958-2_31
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-40380-7
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44958-4
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive