Abstract

The perceived dominance of percepts within a rival pair of images can be influenced by
emotional content, with emotional images dominating over neutral images. We investigated this
effect in the periphery. Rival gratings and (fearful or neutral) face/house pairs were viewed centrally
and with the near edge positioned 1degree and 4degrees from the fixation. Both fearful and neutral faces
were perceived as dominant for significantly longer than houses, with fearful faces dominating
for significantly longer than neutral faces at all three eccentricities. There was no difference
between dominances at 18 and 48 eccentricity, and there was no difference in the dominance of
the gratings at any eccentricity. Our findings show that face stimuli, and in particular fearful
faces, continue to dominate perception in binocular rivalry even when viewed in the periphery.