Abstract
For the purpose of observing the way child patients look at the face of their mothers in photographs and determining the places where they find it easiest to recognize their mothers, we started a series of experiments by showing each child one photograph of his mother's face and measured the subject's eye movements using an eye camera. After that, a panel of the three photos-one photo being his mother's and the other two other women's arranged vertically-was presented, and the eye movements were measured while the child was trying to identify his mother.
To examine if there is some relationship of the eye movements of the subjects in their search of their mothers to other factors such as those associated with their mothers, home environment and the characterization in the Takagi-Sakamoto juvenile personality test, a multivariate analysis was performed.
The following is a summary of our findings:
1. When the mother's photograph was presented, the time required for the primary point of observation to rest on the photo was 492.8 msec.
2. In the experiment where the three vertically arranged photos were shown, the average time needed to perceive the mother's photo was shortest when it was placed in the middle.
3. In the same experiment, the majority of the subjects looked at the photo in the middle first, then the photo at the top and the photo at the bottom, in that order.
4. The primary point of observation was placed on the photo at the bottom by none of those subjects whose mother's photo was placed at the top,5% of those whose mother's photo was in the middle and 35 % of those whose mother's photo was at the bottom.
5. The time required for the children to perceive seemed to reflect mother-child relations, home environment and other factors such as those mentioned in the Takagi-Sakamoto juvenile personality test. Especially relevant were motherchild relations and the personality inventory of the Takagi-Sakamoto test.
6. Whether the primary point of observation is on the mother's photo or on the other two photos also reflected mother-child relations, home environment and the results of the Takagi-Sakamoto personality test.
