Contemporary research findings in the fields of perceptual psychology and neurology of the human brain that are directly related to the study of visual communication are reviewed and briefly discussed in this paper. Specifically, the paper identifies those major research findings in visual perception that are relevant to the study of visual communication in regard to the key variables in picture perception, examines those key neurological and neurophysiological findings that relate to the study of images insofar as the hemisphere specializations of the brain are concerned, and provides some examples and suggestions for empirical research in visual communication drawn from the review of the few key studies that now exist in the field. (Author)