Perceived vertical and eye level as one orientation process: a closed-form account of the Li-Matin combination rules for egocentric space

Abstract

Li and Matin (2005a, 2005b) reported three regularities of the induced visually-perceived vertical (VPV), the direction judged upright. For small tilts, a peripheral line shifts it nearly linearly with tilt, two lines combine nearly linearly, and mirror-image tilts cancel. Each line votes at twice its angle, weighted by its strength. The votes' vector sum $c_1$ is the first circular moment of the doubled angles; half its angle, $\varphi =\frac{1}{2}\arg c_1$, is the induced vertical, a stimulus axis, not the judged upright. This is the orientation order-parameter model (PLUMB). We prove that $c_1$ is, up to a constant factor, the only additive summary of axes (lines without arrowheads) that scales with line strength and turns twice as far as the field rotates. With Li and Matin's own length gain and no per-configuration fit, the model matches their multiline coefficients in-sample. Their data rule out complete summation but not simple averaging for long lines. But a line's effect is fourfold (period $90^{\circ }$): it reverses past $45^{\circ }$ (Li and Matin, 2005a; Vingerhoets et al., 2009), and near-horizontal lines shift VPV as near-vertical ones do, which $c_1$ forbids. In a two-harmonic fit to Li and Matin's data, $c_1$ carries an estimated 2--4% of a near-vertical line's slope and a fourfold term the rest. To first order in tilt, for near-vertical segments, the readout equals the committee rule Shavit, Li, and Matin (2026) fit to eight line-array experiments, with its drives read as concentrations. If the half-fields' signals are read as sum and difference, perceived eye level (VPEL) is the difference, recovering Shavit, Li, and Matin's (2013) reversed integration rules; a fourfold term gives the same signals, so this does not single out $c_1$. Re-analysed data (30 observers) show the predicted signs and nulls, an internal check only; the cross-field gain is fitted.

arXiv comment50 pages, 14 figures. v4: Sec. 5.3 corrects a misread source and reports that single-line induction is fourfold: near-horizontal lines shift the vertical the same way as near-vertical ones, so the first moment carries an estimated 2-4% of it; the combination rules stand. Vingerhoets et al. (2009) and Mittelstaedt (1983) now credited. Sec. 5.6 fixes a second-harmonic jump