DeLoss Denton J, Andersen George J
Department of Psychology, University of California Riverside, Riverside, California, United States of America.
PLoS One. 2015 Nov 30;10(11):e0143773. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0143773. eCollection 2015.
The present study examined age-related differences in multisensory integration and the effect of spatial disparity on the sound-induced flash illusion--an illusion used in previous research to assess age-related differences in multisensory integration. Prior to participation in the study, both younger and older participants demonstrated their ability to detect 1-2 visual flashes and 1-2 auditory beep presented unimodally. After passing the pre-test, participants were then presented 1-2 flashes paired with 0-2 beeps that originated from one of five speakers positioned equidistantly 100 cm from the participant. One speaker was positioned directly below the screen, two speakers were positioned 50 cm to the left and right from the center of the screen, and two more speakers positioned to the left and right 100 cm from the center of the screen. Participants were told to report the number of flashes presented and to ignore the beeps. Both age groups showed a significant effect of the beeps on the perceived number of flashes. However, neither younger nor older individuals showed any significant effect of spatial disparity on the sound-induced flash illusion. The presence of a congruent number of beeps increased accuracy for both older and younger individuals. Reaction time data was also analyzed. As expected, older individuals showed significantly longer reaction times when compared to younger individuals. In addition, both older and younger individuals showed a significant increase in reaction time for fusion trials, where two flashes and one beep are perceived as a single flash, as compared to congruent single flash trials. This increase in reaction time was not found for fission trials, where one flash and two beeps were perceived as two flashes. This suggests that processing may differ for the two forms for fission as compared to fusion illusions.
本研究考察了多感官整合中与年龄相关的差异，以及空间视差对声音诱发闪光错觉的影响——此前研究中曾使用该错觉来评估多感官整合中与年龄相关的差异。在参与研究之前，年轻和年长的参与者都展示了他们单模态检测1至2次视觉闪光和1至2次听觉哔哔声的能力。通过预测试后，参与者会看到1至2次闪光与0至2次哔哔声配对出现，这些哔哔声来自距离参与者100厘米等距排列的五个扬声器中的一个。一个扬声器位于屏幕正下方，两个扬声器位于屏幕中心左右50厘米处，另外两个扬声器位于屏幕中心左右100厘米处。参与者被告知报告出现的闪光次数，忽略哔哔声。两个年龄组都显示出哔哔声对闪光感知数量有显著影响。然而，无论是年轻人还是年长者，空间视差对声音诱发闪光错觉均未显示出任何显著影响。相同数量哔哔声的出现提高了年长者和年轻人的准确性。研究还分析了反应时间数据。正如预期的那样，与年轻人相比，年长者的反应时间明显更长。此外，与一致的单闪光试验相比，在融合试验（其中两次闪光和一次哔哔声被感知为一次闪光）中，年长者和年轻人的反应时间均显著增加。在裂变试验（其中一次闪光和两次哔哔声被感知为两次闪光）中未发现反应时间的这种增加。这表明与融合错觉相比，两种形式的裂变在处理过程上可能有所不同。
