Contour features predict valence and threat judgements in scenes

Quickly scanning an environment to determine relative threat is an essential part of survival. Scene gist extracted rapidly from the environment may help people detect threats. Here, we probed this link between emotional judgements and features of visual scenes. We first extracted curvature, length, and orientation statistics of all images in the International Affective Picture System image set and related them to emotional valence scores. Images containing angular contours were rated as negative, and images containing long contours as positive. We then composed new abstract line drawings with specific combinations of length, angularity, and orientation values and asked participants to rate them as positive or negative, and as safe or threatening. Smooth, long, horizontal contour scenes were rated as positive/safe, while short angular contour scenes were rated as negative/threatening. Our work shows that particular combinations of image features help people make judgements about potential threat in the environment.