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Rapid volitional control of apparent motion during percept generation.
Julia A Mossbridge1, Laura Ortega, Marcia Grabowecky
1Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA, j-mossbridge@northwestern.edu.
Attention, Perception & Psychophysics
|July 19, 2013
Summary
Humans can intentionally control visual perception rapidly. This study shows people can generate desired motion percepts within milliseconds using auditory cues, demonstrating quick intentional influence on perception.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Neuroscience
- Visual Perception
Background:
- Voluntary visual-spatial attention is well-understood.
- The time course of intentional control over percept generation remains largely unknown.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the time course of intentional control over percept generation.
- To determine how rapidly individuals can voluntarily influence their perception of motion.
Main Methods:
- Utilized "one-shot" apparent motion with ambiguous visual stimuli (rotated squares).
- Participants received auditory cues (high/low pitch) to intentionally induce clockwise or counterclockwise rotation perception.
- Varied the cue-lead time between auditory cue and visual stimulus (0 to 1067 ms).
Main Results:
- Intentional control over motion perception improved with longer cue-lead times, reaching asymptotic effectiveness at 533 ms.
- Reliable intentional control was observed even with a zero cue-lead time.
- Control experiments excluded response bias and auditory-visual association as alternative explanations.
Conclusions:
- Individuals can interpret auditory cues and intentionally generate desired motion percepts with surprising speed.
- This rapid intentional control occurs within the subjective moment of visual percept construction.
- Demonstrates a swift capacity for voluntary influence over visual perception.
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