title: Implicit perceptual memory modulates early visual processing of ambiguous images.
abstract: The way we perceive the present visual environment is influenced by past visual experiences. Here we investigated the neural basis of such experience dependency. We repeatedly presented human observers with an ambiguous visual stimulus (structure-from-motion) that can give rise to two distinct perceptual interpretations. Past visual experience is known to influence the perception of such stimuli. We recorded fast dynamics of neural activity shortly after stimulus onset using event-related electroencephalography. The number of previous occurrences of a certain percept modulated early posterior brain activity starting as early as 50 ms after stimulus onset. This modulation developed across hundreds of percept repetitions, reflecting several minutes of accumulating perceptual experience. Importantly, there was no such modulation when the mere number of previous stimulus presentations was considered regardless of how they were perceived. This indicates that the effect depended on previous perception rather than previous visual input. The short latency and posterior scalp location of the effect suggest that perceptual history modified bottom-up stimulus processing in early visual cortex. We propose that bottom-up neural responses to a given visual presentation are shaped, in part, by feedback modulation that occurred during previous presentations, thus allowing these responses to be biased in light of previous perceptual decisions.
authors: Helmholtz Institute and dejongmc@gmail.com.
authors: Maartje C
authors: MC
authors: de Jong
authors: Helmholtz Institute and.
authors: Jan W
authors: JW
authors: Brascamp
authors: Helmholtz Institute and Department of Developmental Psychology, Utrecht University, 3508 TC Utrecht, The Netherlands, Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Rudolf Magnus Institute of Neuroscience, University Medical Centre, 3584 CX Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors: Chantal
authors: C
authors: Kemner
authors: Philips Research Laboratories, Department of Brain, Body, and Behavior, 5656 AE Eindhoven, The Netherlands, Laboratory of Experimental Psychology, University of Leuven, 3000 Leuven, Belgium, Donders Institute, Department of Biophysics, Radboud University, 6500 GL Nijmegen, The Netherlands, and.
authors: Raymond
authors: R
authors: van Ee
authors: Helmholtz Institute and University of Sydney, Faculty of Science, School of Psychology, Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia.
authors: Frans A J
authors: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5487-1755
authors: FA
authors: Verstraten
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory / Q000502:physiology*; D009039:Motion Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000379:methods*; D014793:Visual Cortex / Q000502:physiology*
keywords: EEG; ambiguous figures; perceptual memory; perceptual rivalry; vision; visual cortex