Illumination frame of reference in the object-reviewing paradigm: A case of luminance and lightness

The present study combines the object-reviewing paradigm (Kahneman, Treisman, & Gibbs, 1990) with the checkershadow illusion (Adelson, 1995) in order to contrast the effects of objects’ luminance versus lightness on the object-specific preview benefit. To this end, we manipulated objects’ luminance and the amount of illumination given by an informative background scene in four experiments. In line with previous studies (Moore, Stephens, & Hein, 2010), there was no object-specific preview benefit when objects were presented on a uniformly colored background and luminance switched between objects. In contrast, when objects were presented on the checkershadow illusion background which provided an explanation for the luminance switch, a reliable object-specific preview benefit was observed. This suggests that object correspondence as measured by the object-reviewing paradigm can be influenced by scene-induced, perceived lightness of objects’ surfaces. We replicated this finding and moreover showed that the scene context only influences the object-specific preview benefit if the objects are perceived as part of the background scene.