Department of Neuroscience, Georgetown University Medical Center, Washington, DC 20007, USA.
J Exp Psychol Hum Percept Perform. 2012 Oct;38(5):1168-82. doi: 10.1037/a0028767. Epub 2012 Jun 11.
Whereas physiological studies indicate that illusory contours (ICs) are signaled in early visual areas at short latencies, behavioral studies are divided as to whether IC processing can proceed in a fast, automatic, bottom-up manner or whether it requires extensive top-down intracortical feedback or even awareness and cognition. Here, we employ a response priming paradigm to assess two measures of IC processing using identical stimuli: response priming by ICs, which can occur independently of visual awareness, and a measure of visual awareness of the ICs. In three experiments, participants responded to the orientation of illusory and real-contour targets preceded by illusory and real-contour primes at stimulus-onset asynchronies from 35 to 106 ms. Both illusory and real-contour targets were strongly primed by ICs, and this effect was independent of prime visibility. The effect was fully present in the fastest responses and cannot be explained by responses to stimulus features other than the ICs. Results indicate that ICs, regardless of whether they are consciously perceived, activate fast motor responses, indicating that they are processed without time-consuming intracortical feedback. We conclude that conflicting studies were based on qualitatively different measures of IC processing, some depending on visual awareness and others independent of it.
虽然生理研究表明，错觉轮廓（IC）在早期视觉区域中以短潜伏期发出信号，但行为研究对于 IC 处理是否可以快速、自动、自下而上进行，或者是否需要广泛的皮层内反馈，甚至需要意识和认知，存在分歧。在这里，我们使用反应启动范式来评估两种使用相同刺激的 IC 处理的测量方法：IC 引起的反应启动，它可以独立于视觉意识发生，以及 IC 视觉意识的测量。在三个实验中，参与者在刺激呈现后 35 到 106 毫秒的时间内，对错觉和真实轮廓目标的方向做出反应，这些目标之前有错觉和真实轮廓的启动。错觉和真实轮廓目标都被 IC 强烈启动，并且这种效果与启动的可见性无关。该效果在最快的反应中完全存在，不能用除 IC 之外的其他刺激特征的反应来解释。结果表明，IC 无论是否被有意识地感知，都会激活快速的运动反应，这表明它们在没有耗时的皮层内反馈的情况下进行处理。我们的结论是，相互矛盾的研究基于 IC 处理的定性不同的测量方法，有些依赖于视觉意识，而有些则不依赖于视觉意识。
