John I. Yellott, Jr.  (949)-824-7278 jyellott@uci.edu  Ph.D. Stanford University, 1966 (Psychology). Fellow, American Psychological Society, Optical Society of America; Editorial Board, Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1987-present; Chair, UCI Cognitive Sciences Department, 1986-1991, 1996-99.

I've worked on topics including retinal anatomy (21,24,39), retinal image processing (31,35,38), texture perception (43,45), and models for choice behavior (14,15,17,19,45). Now I am studying: Metacontrast. This is a type of visual masking in which the visibility of a brieflyflashed target stimulus is reduced by a second stimulus, the mask, that is also briefly flashed, but slightly later and at a different location in the visual field. I'm interested in the effects of target-mask similarity on strength of masking. One recent finding is that some stimulus displays can produce a form of motion perception in which no motion is experienced consciously, but certain perceptual consequences of motion occur nevertheless, showing that the original motion was registered by the visual system, but not a level accessible to consciousness. Ranking Models and Irreversibility. Suppose two people A and B repeatedly express their preferences for the same three objects x,y,z by rank ordering them, and that whenever A produces any given ranking, say x y z, B always perversely produces exactly the opposite ordering -- here z y x. In that case we say that A and B have "opposite preference systems." Some mathematical models for ranking have the curious property that whenever the model predicts any given system of preference probabilities, it can never predict the opposite of that system. Such a model is said to be "completely irreversible." I'm trying to determine which classes of models do and do not have this property.

Publications

(2) Probability matching. Psychometrika, l966, 31, 43-69. (M. F. Norman and Yellott).

(3) Influence of correlated visual cues on auditory signal detection. Perception and Psychophysics, l966, 1, 67-73. (R. A. Kinchla, J. Townsend, Yellott and R. C. Atkinson).

(4) Correction for guessing in choice reaction time. Psychonomic Science, 1967, 8, 321-322.

(5) Probability learning with noncontingent success. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1969, 6, 541-575.

(6) Second choices in a visual span of apprehension task. Perception and Psychophysics, 1970, 7, 57-62. (Yellott and P. Curnow).

(7) A cueing technique in choice reaction time. Perception and Psychophysics, 1970, 1, 57-62. (D. LaBerge, P. Van Gelder, and J. Yellott).

(8) Upgrading the cookbook. (Review of Gelbaum and March: Mathematics for the Social and Behavioral Sciences), Contempory Psychology 1970.

(9) Correction for fast guessing and the speed-accuracy tradeoff in choice reaction time. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1971, 8, 2, 159-199.

(10) What's nu in math psych? (Review of Coombs, Dawes and Tversky: Mathematical Psychology and Restle and Greeno: Introduction to Mathemtical Psychology). Contempory Psychology 1970.

(11) Review of B. Julesz: Foundations of Cyclopian Perception. Behavioral Science 1972.

(12) Color properties of the contrast flash effect: monoptic vs dichoptic comparisons. Vision Research, 1976, 16, 1275-1280 (Yellott and B. Wandell).

(13) Problem P159. Aeq. Mathematica, 1976 14, 228 (J. Aczel and Yellott).

(14) The relationship between Luce's choice axiom, Thurstone's theory of comparative judgment, and the double exponential distribution. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1977, 15, 2, 109-144.

(15) On a functional equation related to Thurstone models. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1978, 17, 3, 266-270.

(16) Translation of "L'equivalence des modeles du Thurstone" by Z. Mosner, Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1978, 17, 3, 263-265.

(17) A note on equivalent Thurstone models. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1979, 19, 65-71. (C. Rockwell and Yellott).

(18) Depth inversion despite stereopsis: the appearance of random dot stereograms on surfaces seen in reverse perspective. Perception, 1979, 8, 135-142. (Yellott and J. Kaiwi).

(19) Generalized Thurstone models for ranking: Equivalence and reversibility. Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1980, 22, 1, 48-69.

(20) Binocular depth inversion. Scientific American, 245, 1, July l98l.

(21) Spectral analysis of spatial sampling by photoreceptors: Topological disorder prevents aliasing. Vision Research, 1982, 22, 1205-1210.

(22) Spectral analysis of spatial sampling by photoreceptors. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1982, 22, No. 3, p. 78. (abstract).

(23) Review of T. Caelli: Visual Perception, Journal of Mathematical Psychology, 1982, 25, 2-6 (Yellott and A. Ahumada).

(24) Spectral consequences of photoreceptor sampling in the rhesus retina. Science, 1983, 221, 382-385.

(25) Reduction of display artifacts by random sampling. Proceedings of the SPIE, 1983, 432, 216-221: Applications of Digital Image Processing. (Ahumada, Nagel, Watson and Yellott).

(26) Nonhomogeneous Poisson disks model the photoreceptor mosaic. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1983, 24, No. 3, p. 145. (abstract).

(27) The Beginnings of Visual Perception: The Retinal Image and Its Initial Encoding. Handbook of Physiology, Section 1: The Nervous System, Vol. III, Part 2. I. Darian-Smith, Ed., Am. Physiological Society Publisher, 1984. (Yellott, B. Wandell, and T. Cornsweet).

(28) Image sampling properties of photoreceptors: a reply to Miller and Bernard. Vision Research, 1984, 24, 281-282.

(29) Mach bands without inhibition. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1984, 25, No. 3, p. 53 (T. Cornsweet and J. Yellott). (abstract).

(30) Teaching learning theory. (Review of T. Wickens: Models for Behavior.) Contemporary Psychology, 1984, 29, 486-487. (Yellott and C. Lofgren)

(31) Intensity dependent spatial summation. Journal of the Optical Society of America - A, 1985, 2, 1769-1786 (T. Cornsweet and Yellott).

(32) Intensity dependent spatial summation and lateral inhibition. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1985, 26, No. 3, p. 138 (Yellott, T. Cornsweet, and S. Reuman) (abstract).

(33) A model for foveal photoreceptor placement. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1985, 26, No. 3, p. 11 (A. Ahumada and Yellott) (abstract).

(34) Intensity dependent spatial summation and photon noise. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1986, 27, No. 3, p. 342 (Yellott, S. Reuman, K. Schindler) (abstract).

(35) Photon noise and constant volume operators. Journal of the Optical Society of America - A, 1987, 4, No. 12, 2418-2446.

(36) Consequences of spatially irregular sampling for reconstruction of photon noisy images, Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1987, 28, No.3, (abstract).

(37) A connectionist model for learning receptor positions. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1988, 29, p.58 (A. Ahumada and Yellott) (abstract).

(38) Constant volume operators and lateral inhibition. J. Mathematical Psychology. 1989, 33, No. 1, 1-35.

(39) Reconstructing irregularly sampled images by neural networks in Human Vision, Visual Processing, and Digital Display, B. Rogowitz, Ed. Proc. SPIE, 1989, Vol. 1077, 228-235. (A. Ahumada and Yellott).

(40) The photoreceptor mosaic as an image sampling device. In Advances in Photoreception: Proceedings of a Symposium on Frontiers of Visual Science, National Academy Press, Washington, 1990.

(41) Triple correlation and texture discrimination. Investigative Ophthalmology and Visual Science, 1990, 31, no. 4, p. 561. (Yellott and G. Iverson) (abstract).

(42) Triple correlation and texture discrimination. In From Learning Theory to Connectionism: Essays in Honor of William K. Estes, S. Kosslyn, A. Healy, and R. Shiffren, Eds., Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1992.

(43) Uniqueness properties of higher-order autocorrelation functions. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, 1992, 5, 388-404. (Yellott and G. Iverson).

(44) Implications of triple correlation uniqueness for texture statistics and the Julesz conjecture. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, 1993, 5, 777-793.

(45) Preference models and irreversibility. In Choice, Decision, and Measurement: Essays in Honor of R. Duncan Luce, A.A.J. Marley (Ed.), Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1997.

(46) Every discrete finite image is uniquely determined by its dipole histogram. (C.F. Chubb and Yellott), Vision Research, 2000, 40, 485-492.

(47) Luce's Choice Axiom. Article to appear in the International Encyclopedia of the Social and Behavioral Sciences, N.J. Smelser and P.B. Bates (Eds.), Pergamon, 2001

(48) Dipole statistics of discrete finate images: Two visually motivated representation of theorems. (C.F. Chubb and Yellott). Journal of the Optical Society of America A, to appear 2002.

Jack Yellott's Dates in the History of Vision Research