title: Human visual processing oscillates: evidence from a classification image technique.
abstract: Recent investigations have proposed that visual information may be sampled in a discrete manner, similarly to the snapshots of a camera, but this hypothesis remains controversial. Moreover, assuming a discrete sampling of information, the properties of this sampling-for instance, the frequency at which it operates, and how it synchronizes with the environment-still need to be clarified. We systematically modulated the signal-to-noise ratio of faces through time and examined how it impacted face identification performance. Altogether, our results support the hypothesis of discrete sampling. Furthermore, they suggest that this mechanism may operate at a rate of about 10-15Hz and that it is synchronized with the onset of the stimulus.
authors.affiliation: Département de Psychoéducation et de Psychologie, Université du Québec en Outaouais, Canada. caroline.blais@uqo.ca
authors.forename: Caroline
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Blais
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Arguin
authors.forename: Frédéric
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Gosselin
mesh_terms: D005145:Face; D006801:Humans; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D059629:Signal-To-Noise Ratio; D014796:Visual Perception / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: Oscillations; Temporal processing; Visual perception; Visual sampling