Ohl Sven, Rolfs Martin
Department of Psychology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Rudower Chaussee, Berlin, Germany.
Berlin School of Mind and Brain, Berlin, Germany.
Elife. 2025 Apr 3;13:RP93454. doi: 10.7554/eLife.93454.
Detecting causal relations structures our perception of events in the world. Here, we determined for visual interactions whether generalized (i.e. feature-invariant) or specialized (i.e. feature-selective) visual routines underlie the perception of causality. To this end, we applied a visual adaptation protocol to assess the adaptability of specific features in classical launching events of simple geometric shapes. We asked observers to report whether they observed a launch or a pass in ambiguous test events (i.e. the overlap between two discs varied from trial to trial). After prolonged exposure to causal launch events (the adaptor) defined by a particular set of features (i.e. a particular motion direction, motion speed, or feature conjunction), observers were less likely to see causal launches in subsequent ambiguous test events than before adaptation. Crucially, adaptation was contingent on the causal impression in launches as demonstrated by a lack of adaptation in non-causal control events. We assessed whether this negative aftereffect transfers to test events with a new set of feature values that were not presented during adaptation. Processing in specialized (as opposed to generalized) visual routines predicts that the transfer of visual adaptation depends on the feature similarity of the adaptor and the test event. We show that the negative aftereffects do not transfer to unadapted launch directions but do transfer to launch events of different speeds. Finally, we used colored discs to assign distinct feature-based identities to the launching and the launched stimulus. We found that the adaptation transferred across colors if the test event had the same motion direction as the adaptor. In summary, visual adaptation allowed us to carve out a visual feature space underlying the perception of causality and revealed specialized visual routines that are tuned to a launch's motion direction.
检测因果关系构建了我们对世界中事件的认知。在此,我们确定在视觉交互中,是通用的(即特征不变的)还是专门的(即特征选择性的)视觉程序构成了因果关系认知的基础。为此,我们应用了一种视觉适应方案来评估简单几何形状的经典启动事件中特定特征的适应性。我们要求观察者报告在模糊测试事件(即两个圆盘的重叠在每次试验中都不同)中他们观察到的是启动还是通过。在长时间暴露于由特定一组特征(即特定的运动方向、运动速度或特征组合)定义的因果启动事件(适应刺激)后,观察者在随后的模糊测试事件中比适应前更不容易看到因果启动。至关重要的是,适应取决于启动中的因果印象,这一点通过非因果控制事件中缺乏适应得以证明。我们评估了这种负后效是否会转移到具有适应期间未呈现的一组新特征值的测试事件中。专门的(与通用的相对)视觉程序中的处理预测,视觉适应的转移取决于适应刺激和测试事件的特征相似性。我们表明,负后效不会转移到未适应的启动方向,但会转移到不同速度的启动事件中。最后,我们使用彩色圆盘为启动刺激和被启动刺激赋予基于特征的不同身份。我们发现,如果测试事件与适应刺激具有相同的运动方向,适应会跨颜色转移。总之,视觉适应使我们能够勾勒出因果关系认知背后的视觉特征空间,并揭示了针对启动运动方向进行调整的专门视觉程序。
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