title: Dual mechanisms governing reward-driven perceptual learning.
abstract: In this review, we explore how reward signals shape perceptual learning in animals and humans. Perceptual learning is the well-established phenomenon by which extensive practice elicits selective improvement in one's perceptual discrimination of basic visual features, such as oriented lines or moving stimuli. While perceptual learning has long been thought to rely on 'top-down' processes, such as attention and decision-making, a wave of recent findings suggests that these higher-level processes are, in fact, not necessary.  Rather, these recent findings indicate that reward signals alone, in the absence of the contribution of higher-level cognitive processes, are sufficient to drive the benefits of perceptual learning. Here, we will review the literature tying reward signals to perceptual learning. Based on these findings, we propose dual underlying mechanisms that give rise to perceptual learning: one mechanism that operates 'automatically' and is tied directly to reward signals, and another mechanism that involves more 'top-down', goal-directed computations.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA ; Center for Computational Neuroscience and Neural Technology, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA.
authors.forename: Dongho
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA ; Center for Computational Neuroscience and Neural Technology, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA ; Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior, Radboud University, Nijmegen, Netherlands.
authors.forename: Sam
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ling
authors.affiliation: Department of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA.
authors.forename: Takeo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Watanabe
keywords: Perceptual learning; Reward; Vision; automatic; contingency; goal-directed; task-irrelevant; temporal contiguity