The recognition of partially visible natural objects in the presence and absence of their occluders

The visual system is adept at compensating for the missing information in scenes that results from occlusion, but how this is done is not fully understood. In particular, the role of the occluding object in visual processing and its effect on the subsequent recognition of the occluded object is unclear. We report three human behavioral experiments suggesting that the recognition of partially visible objects is facilitated when the missing object information is replaced by an occluder rather than simply removed. Furthermore, we provide EEG evidence suggesting that the processes responsible for facilitated recognition occur relatively early in the visual stream.