Continuous flash suppression: Manual action affects eye movements but not the reported percept

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Neuroscience
• Perception
• Motor Control

Background:

• Shared representations between motor and perceptual systems are suggested by various paradigms.
• Continuous flash suppression (CFS) is a technique used to study visual awareness and perception.

Purpose of the Study:

• To investigate the influence of manual action on the perception of ambiguous visual stimuli.
• To explore how different levels of coupling between manual action and visual stimuli affect perception and eye movements within a CFS paradigm.

Main Methods:

• Participants performed a continuous flash suppression (CFS) experiment.
• Manual action was manipulated by rotating a manipulandum to control a suppressed visual grating's motion with varying degrees of coupling.
• Subjective visibility reports and eye movements (optokinetic nystagmus gain) were measured.

Main Results:

• Manual action did not significantly alter the subjective visibility of the suppressed grating.
• The gain of optokinetic nystagmus induced by the grating was modulated by the degree of coupling with manual movement.
• This contrasts with previous findings, suggesting CFS engages action-perception representations differently.

Conclusions:

• Action-to-perception transfer can operate at different organizational levels, including subconscious processing.
• Continuous flash suppression (CFS) reveals distinct mechanisms of action-perception interaction compared to other experimental paradigms.
• Eye movements reflect action-perception coupling even when subjective awareness is unaffected.