Temporal integration and segregation of brief visual stimuli: patterns of correlation in time

Two brief sequential displays separated by a brief interstimulus interval (ISI) are often perceived as a temporally integrated unitary configuration. The probability of temporal integration can be decreased by increasing the ISI or (counterintuitively) by increasing stimulus duration. We tested three hypotheses of the relative contributions of stimulus duration and ISI to the breakdown of temporal integration (the storage, processing, and temporal correlation hypotheses). In the first of two experiments, stimulus duration and ISI were varied factorially, and estimates of temporal integration were obtained with a form-part integration task. The second experiment was a replication of the first at two levels of stimulus intensity. The outcomes were inconsistent with the storage and processing options, but confirmed predictions from the temporal correlation hypothesis. Whether two sequential stimuli are perceived as temporally integrated or disjoint depends not on the availability of visible persistence, but on the emergence of a neural code that is based on the temporal correlation between the two visual responses.