When brain damage "improves" perception: neglect patients can localize motion-shifted probes better than controls.
When we look at bars flashed against a moving background, we see them displaced in the direction of the upcoming motion (flash-grab illusion). It is still debated whether these motion-induced position shifts are low-level, reflexive consequences of stimulus motion or high-level compensation engaged only when the stimulus is tracked with attention. To investigate whether attention is a causal factor for this striking illusory position shift, we evaluated the flash-grab illusion in six patients with damaged attentional networks in the right hemisphere and signs of left visual neglect and six age-matched controls. With stimuli in the top, right, and bottom visual fields, neglect patients experienced the same amount of illusion as controls. However, patients showed no significant shift when the test was presented in their left hemifield, despite having equally precise judgments. Thus, paradoxically, neglect patients perceived the position of the flash more veridically in their neglected hemifield. These results suggest that impaired attentional processes can reduce the interaction between a moving background and a superimposed stationary flash, and indicate that attention is a critical factor in generating the illusory motion-induced shifts of location.
INSERM U1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Sorbonne Universités, and Université Pierre et Marie Curie-Paris 6, UMR S1127, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière, Paris, France; Department of Psychology, Catholic University, Milan, Italy; stdevit@gmail.com.
Stefania
S
de Vito
INSERM U1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Sorbonne Universités, and Université Pierre et Marie Curie-Paris 6, UMR S1127, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière, Paris, France;
Marine
M
Lunven
Centre de Rééducation Fonctionnelle Les Trois Soleils, Boissise Le Roi, France;
Clémence
C
Bourlon
Centre de Rééducation Fonctionnelle Les Trois Soleils, Boissise Le Roi, France;
Christophe
C
Duret
Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, Université Paris Descartes, Centre Biomédical des Saints Péres, Paris, France; and Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire.
Patrick
P
Cavanagh
INSERM U1127, CNRS UMR 7225, Sorbonne Universités, and Université Pierre et Marie Curie-Paris 6, UMR S1127, Institut du Cerveau et de la Moelle épinière, Paris, France; Department of Psychology, Catholic University, Milan, Italy;
Paolo
P
Bartolomeo
D000368:Aged; D001288:Attention; D001921:Brain / Q000502:physiology*; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D007088:Illusions; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009038:Motion; D009039:Motion Perception; D013028:Space Perception; D014794:Visual Fields
attention; left visual neglect; motion-induced position shift