Visual Fixation Patterns when Judging Image Quality: Effects of Distortion Type, Amount, and Subject Experience

Human visual fixation patterns can provide important insights into how biological systems address the image-analysis problem. This paper presents the results of two eye-tracking experiments designed to investigate how normal visual fixations may be affected when judging image quality. We asked (1) whether people look at different regions when judging image quality vs. just looking; and (2) how different types and amounts of distortion affect fixations. We found that white noise and blurring do not change fixations relative to the task-free condition, whereas compression artifacts can influence fixations, depending on the amount of distortion.