Welcome to the CSU Witt Perception Lab
The lab focuses on two research areas: Information Visualization and Action-specific Perception.
Research on information visualization leverages knowledge about the visual system for constructing visualizations (graphs, pictographs, charts) to enhance understanding of simple and complex information. The specific focuses of the research are on basic graph design and understanding uncertainty. The work on uncertainty is currently being applied to medical decisions and health disparties, as well as climate and weather predictions.
Research on action-specific perception focuses on how visual perception of spatial properties such as size, distance, and speed is influenced by the perceiver’s ability to act on the target. For example, softball players who are hitting better than others see the ball as bigger. As another example, targets appear to be moving slower when they are easier to catch. This research demonstrates that perception is action-specific, meaning that what is seen is specific to the observer’s ability to perform the intended action.
Lab PI
Dr. Jessica Witt is a Professor in Psychology at CSU. Dr. Witt received her Ph.D from the University of Virginia in 2007, and has been at CSU since 2012. Dr. Witt recently won the American Psychological Association’s Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology (2017), the Janet Taylor Spence Award for transformative early career contributions from APS (2015) and the Steve Yantis Early Career Award from the Psychonomic Society (2014). Her CV can be found here. Dr. Witt’s research has been continuously funded by NSF since 2010.
Lab Members
Amelia Warden, Ph.D. student
Announcements
Contact Dr. Witt if you want to do undergraduate research in the lab.
Prospective Graduate Students
The lab is always recruiting highly motivated and qualified graduate students. This year, I will be recruiting students for my research on information visualization.
