Physical and Biological Constraints Govern Perceived Animacy of Scrambled Human Forms

Point-light animations of biological motion are perceived quickly and spontaneously, giving rise to an irresistible sensation of animacy. However, the mechanisms that support judgments of animacy based on biological motion remain unclear. The current study demonstrates that animacy ratings increase when a spatially scrambled animation of human walking maintains consistency with two fundamental constraints: the direction of gravity and congruency between the directions of intrinsic and extrinsic motion. Furthermore, using a reverse-correlation method, we show that observers employ structural templates, or form-based “priors,” reflecting the prototypical mammalian body plan when attributing animacy to scrambled human forms. These findings reveal that perception of animacy in scrambled biological motion involves not only analysis of local intrinsic motion, but also its congruency with global extrinsic motion and global spatial structure. Thus, they suggest a strong influence of prior knowledge about characteristic features of creatures in the natural environment.