BLINKING AND GAZE FIXATION AS MECHANISMS OF SEGMENTATION OF VISUAL EXPERIENCE

Abstract

The article presents a phenomenological analysis of blinking and gaze fixation as fundamental mechanisms of visual experience segmentation. Visual perception is examined not as a homogeneous and continuous flow, but as a temporally organized process in which discreteness and continuity exist in a dynamic relationship. It is shown that blinking performs the function of micro-temporal interruption that introduces boundaries into the visual stream and shapes the rhythm of experience, whereas gaze fixation creates conditions for the weakening or suspension of such segmentation, opening a mode of relative continuity of vision. On the basis of a description of lived experience, it is argued that segmentation of the visual field is not a secondary effect of interpretative or cognitive operations, but rather emerges as an internal characteristic of the temporal organization of visual consciousness. The analysis of the interaction between blinking and gaze fixation allows the phenomenon of framing to be revealed as a processual rather than technical structure, within which visual experience preserves order without loss of dynamism. Methodologically, the study is grounded in a phenomenological approach and consciously avoids physiological, neurobiological, and normative reductions. The proposed analysis expands the understanding of visual perception by shifting the focus from spatial and object-related characteristics to its temporal organization, and delineates blinking and gaze fixation as key elements of the rhythmic functioning of visual consciousness.