Moerel Denise, Ling Sam, Jehee Janneke F M
J Vis. 2016;16(3):36. doi: 10.1167/16.3.36.
Visual orientation discrimination is known to improve with extensive training, but the mechanisms underlying this behavioral benefit remain poorly understood. Here, we examine the possibility that more reliable task performance could arise in part because observers learn to sample information from a larger portion of the stimulus. We used a variant of the classification image method in combination with a global orientation discrimination task to test whether a change in information sampling underlies training-based benefits in behavioral performance. The results revealed that decreases in orientation thresholds with perceptual learning were accompanied by increases in stimulus sampling. In particular, while stimulus sampling was restricted to the parafoveal, inner portion of the stimulus before training, we observed an outward spread of sampling after training. These results demonstrate that the benefits of perceptual learning may arise, in part, from a strategic increase in the efficiency with which the observer samples information from a visual stimulus.
视觉方向辨别能力会随着大量训练而提高，这是已知的，但这种行为益处背后的机制仍知之甚少。在这里，我们探讨了更可靠的任务表现可能部分源于观察者学会从更大比例的刺激中采样信息的可能性。我们使用了分类图像方法的一种变体，并结合全局方向辨别任务，来测试信息采样的变化是否是基于训练的行为表现提升的基础。结果显示，随着知觉学习，方向阈值的降低伴随着刺激采样的增加。特别是，在训练前，刺激采样仅限于刺激的中央凹旁内侧部分，而在训练后，我们观察到采样向外扩展。这些结果表明，知觉学习的益处可能部分源于观察者从视觉刺激中采样信息的效率的策略性提高。
