In this paper, the effect of background grey levels on the visual perception of target image displayed on CRT monitor has been investigated. The purpose of this study is to investigate the efficacy of CRT monitor as a display medium of image Information especially in medical imaging field. Tllree sets of experiments have been performed in this study : the first was to measure the luminance response of CRT monitor and to find the best fitting equation, and the second was the psychophysical experiment measuring the threshold grey level differences between the target image and the background required for visual discrimination (or various background grey levels, and the third was to develop a visual model that is predictable of the threshold grey level difference measured in the psychophysical experiment. The result of psycophysical experiment shows that the visual perception performance is significantly degraded in the range of grey levels lower than 50, which is turned out due to she low luminance change of CRT monitor in this range while human eye has been adapted lo relatively bright ambient illumination. And it Is also shown in the simulation study using the developed visual model that the dominant factor degrading the visual performance is the reflected light from the monitor surface by ambient light in general illumination condition.