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Is spontaneous level-1 visual perspective taking modulated by the constancy of another agent ’s presence?

Poster Session C - Sunday, March 8, 2026, 5:00 – 7:00 pm PDT, Fairview/Kitsilano Ballroom

Chen LI¹ (), Hiroyuki Muto¹; ¹Osaka Metropolitan University

Altercentric interference refers to delayed or less accurate responses that occur when another agent’s visual perspective differs from an observer’s own. Our previous study demonstrated that, after controlling for directional orienting effects, such interference persists even when the agent is completely task-irrelevant, suggesting automaticity in level-1 visual perspective taking (VPT). However, whether such automaticity truly exists remains debated. Specifically, it remains unclear whether VPT is triggered in a stimulus-driven manner by the mere presence of another agent. To address this issue, the present study examined whether altercentric interference is modulated by the constancy of the agent’s presence. If VPT is truly stimulus-driven, interference should appear only when the agent is present, and its magnitude should be comparable regardless of whether the agent is present consistently or only intermittently. In a preregistered online experiment, 100 participants were randomly assigned to either a Constant group, in which the agent appeared on every trial, or a Variable group, in which agent-present and color-block trials were randomly intermixed. All participants reported the number of balls visible from their own perspective. Results showed significant altercentric interference in the Constant group, replicating our previous finding. In the Variable group, the interference emerged not only on agent-present trials but also on color-block trials, and these effects were comparable to those in the Constant group. This indicates that altercentric interference is unlikely to reflect a stimulus-driven mechanism selectively tied to the presence of an agent, and may instead arise from domain-general or contextual processes.

Topic Area: PERCEPTION & ACTION: Vision