Confuse Your Illusion: Feedback to Early Visual Cortex Contributes to Perceptual Completion

• Published in: Psychological science Vol. 24; no. 1; pp. 63 - 71
• Main Authors: Wokke, Martijn E., Vandenbroucke, Annelinde R. E., Scholte, H. Steven, Lamme, Victor A. F.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Los Angeles, CA SAGE Publications 01.01.2013; Sage Publications; SAGE PUBLICATIONS, INC
• Subjects: Behavioral neuroscience; Biological and medical sciences; Brain; Brain Mapping; Cognition; Cognition & reasoning; Cognitive psychology; Consciousness; Contours; Discrimination; Discrimination (Psychology) - physiology; Female; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; Humans; Magnetic resonance imaging; Male; Neurofeedback - physiology; Neuroscience; Occipital Lobe - physiology; Optical Illusions - physiology; Pattern Recognition, Visual - physiology; Perception; Perceptions; Perceptual Closure - physiology; Psychological effects; Psychology; Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry; Psychology. Psychophysiology; Sensory perception; Time windows; Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation; Vision; Visual cortex; Visual Cortex - physiology; Visual perception; Visual processing; Visual system; Visual task performance; Visualization; Young Adult; object recognition; visual perception; consciousness; cognitive neuroscience; Human; Visual cortex; Transcranial magnetic stimulation; Consciousness; Central nervous system; Feedback regulation; Cognition; Experimental study; Encephalon; Visual pathway; Vision; Optical illusion; Perception; Recognition
• ISSN: 0956-7976; 1467-9280
• DOI: 10.1177/0956797612449175

A striking example of the constructive nature of visual perception is how the human visual system completes contours of occluded objects. To date, it is unclear whether perceptual completion emerges during early stages of visual processing or whether higher-level mechanisms are necessary. To answer this question, we used transcranial magnetic stimulation to disrupt signaling in V1/V2 and in the lateral occipital (LO) area at different moments in time while participants performed a discrimination task involving a Kanizsa-type illusory figure. Results show that both V1/V2 and higher-level visual area LO are critically involved in perceptual completion. However, these areas seem to be involved in an inverse hierarchical fashion, in which the critical time window for V1/V2 follows that for LO. These results are in line with the growing evidence that feedback to V1/V2 contributes to perceptual completion.