Misplaced Pages

The Orbison illusion (or Orbison's illusion) is an optical illusion first described by American psychologist William Orbison (1912–1952) in 1939.

The illusion consists of a two dimensional figure, such as a circle or square, superimposed over a background of radial lines or concentric circles. The result is an optical illusion in which both the figure and the rectangle which contains it appear distorted; in particular, squares appear slightly bulged, circles appear elliptical, and the containing rectangle appears tilted.

References

1. Roeckelein, Jon E. (2006). Elsevier's Dictionary of Psychological Theories. Amsterdam: Elsevier. p. 651. ISBN 9780444517500.
2. "Orbison illusion". opticalillusions.info. Archived from the original on October 7, 2016. Retrieved June 30, 2016.

• Fineman, Mark (1996). The Nature of Visual Illusion. Dover Publications. pp. 152-153. ISBN 0486291057.
• Robinson, J.O. (1998). The Psychology of Visual Illusion. Dover Publications. pp. 72–73. ISBN 978-0486404493.

External links

• Media related to Orbison illusion at Wikimedia Commons

v t e Optical illusions (list)
Illusions	Afterimage Ambigram Ambiguous image Ames room Autostereogram Barberpole Bezold Café wall Checker shadow Chubb Cornsweet Delboeuf Ebbinghaus Ehrenstein Flash lag Fraser spiral Gravity hill Grid Hering Impossible trident Irradiation Jastrow Lilac chaser Mach bands McCollough Müller-Lyer Necker cube Oppel-Kundt Orbison Penrose stairs Penrose triangle Peripheral drift Poggendorff Ponzo Rubin vase Sander Schroeder stairs Shepard tables Spinning dancer Ternus Vertical–horizontal White's Wundt Zöllner
Popular culture	Op art Trompe-l'œil Spectropia (1864 book) Ascending and Descending (1960 drawing) Waterfall (1961 drawing) The dress (2015 photograph)
Related	Accidental viewpoint Auditory illusions Illusions Tactile illusions Temporal illusion

This psychology-related article is a stub. You can help Misplaced Pages by expanding it.

• v
• t
• e

• Optical illusions
• Psychology stubs