Bloch’s law and a temporal integration model for simple reaction time to light

Hildreth, James D.

doi:10.3758/bf03211177

Cited by 23 publications

(25 citation statements)

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“…Measured from S2 (as in Figures 3 and 4), however, RTs would be decreased by the onset asynchrony between SI and S2. Such a conception is consistent with reports that luminous energy may be packaged reciprocally over brief periods of about 30 msec with no consequent effects on simple response latency (Bruder & Kietzman, 1973;Hildreth, 1973). Moreover, this interpretation is commensurate with Eriksen and Collins's (1967) report that, for three of their five subjects, there was no drop in identification accuracy for the nonsense trigram when the second half was delayed by an lSI of 25 msec.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 76%

Reaction time measurement of temporal integration and organization of form

Rohrbaugh

Eriksen

1975

Perception & Psychophysics

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Temporal integration of patterned stimuli was investigated by introducing an interstimulus interval (lSI) between brief exposures of two matrices of illuminated squares. These matrices were identical except for their spatial displacement, arranged such that they could be superimposed to yield either horizontal or vertical stripes. Choice reaction times to the composite stripe orientation were a progressively increasing function of lSI, suggesting some integration over an lSI range in excess of 224 msec. Similar functions were obtained with both regular and irregular order of lSI presentation. The results from an additional experiment employing an extraneous warning signal discounted the possibility that preparatory factors developing over the lSI were responsible for the obtained reaction time functions.If two visual patterns are presented in rapid succession, they may interact in such a way as to lead to impaired perception of one or the other stimulus. While a number of factors may contribute to this interaction (commonly designated para-or metacontrast), considerable evidence implicates temporal integration of the two stimuli as an important underlying mechanism (Eriksen & Eriksen, 1972). The impaired perception of the target stimulus thus is a consequence of difficulties in dealing separately with the simultaneous representations from both target and mask stimuli. Collins (1967, 1968; and more recently, Pollack, 1973) have demonstrated that such integration does indeed occur by employing a situation obverse to the typical metacontrast paradigm. Eriksen and Collins's subjects viewed two brief stimulus patterns which were presented simultaneously or were separated by short interstimulus intervals (ISIs). The two stimuli were designed, however, not to yield an illegible montage when superimposed, but rather to yield a composite form which could not be discerned in either the first or second pattern by itself. Each of the two stimuli alone appeared to be a random array of dots. Only when the two stimuli were superimposed did the arrangement of dots produce a clearly apparent trigram. The subjects were able to identify this trigram with nearly perfect accuracy when the two stimuli were presented simultaneously, and performance decreased only slightly as an lSI of 2S msec was introduced between the two stimuli. At longer ISIs, accuracy further decreased but did not approach an asymptote until an 53lSI somewhere between 100 and 300 msec. The investigators attributed the gradually decreasing accuracy function to a decay in time of the sensory trace from the first stimulus. If the second stimulus was presented before the decay of the first had progressed too far, the two stimuli were integrated and it became possible to organize the composite nonsense syllable. At ISIs longer than the trace life from the first stimulus, no such organization was possible.In the present experiments, we have adapted the Eriksen and Collins (1967, 1968) paradigm to permit the use of choice reaction time (RT) rather than report accur...

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 76%

Reaction time measurement of temporal integration and organization of form

Rohrbaugh

Eriksen

1975

Perception & Psychophysics

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“…where l 0 is a fixed delay; K is a constant; and C is the stimulus contrast (Hildreth 1973). C was assumed to be the linear sum of two components, such that…”

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The effect of stimuli that isolate S-cones on early saccades and the gap effect

Anderson

Carpenter

2007

Proc. R. Soc. B.

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Disappearance of the fixation spot before the appearance of a peripheral target typically reduces average saccadic reaction times (the gap effect) and may also produce a separate population of early or express saccades. The superior colliculus (SC) is generally believed to be critically involved in generating both effects. As the direct sensory input to the SC does not encode colour information, to determine whether this input was critical in generating the gap effect or express saccades we used coloured targets which this pathway cannot distinguish. Our observers still made early saccades to colour-defined targets, but these were anticipations in response to the offset of the non-coloured fixation target. We also show that a gap effect still occurs when either the fixation target or the peripheral target is colour defined, suggesting that direct sensory input to the SC is not required and that information about the location of colour-defined targets is abstracted prior to processing within the SC.

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“…For the intensities investigated, both the estimated number of Poisson processes and critical number of pulses required for detection range between 8 and 13. The model predicts the Broca-Sulzer effect for mean RTs which is observed in several of these experiments.At least two reports, Bruder and Kietzman (1973) and Hildreth (1973), have provided evidence that Bloch's law (BL) holds for RTs for durations less than 16 msec. It was observed in the former to hold when a narrow range of intensities (L to L/4) was used within a given experiment.…”

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“…At least two reports, Bruder and Kietzman (1973) and Hildreth (1973), have provided evidence that Bloch's law (BL) holds for RTs for durations less than 16 msec. It was observed in the former to hold when a narrow range of intensities (L to L/4) was used within a given experiment.…”

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Bloch’s law and a Poisson counting model for simple reaction time to light

Hildreth¹

1979

Perception & Psychophysics

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A series of three experiments was conducted with identical design as an earlier series (Hildreth, 1973). Its purpose was (1) to determine whether Bloch's law holds for simple reaction time (RT) to still lower intensity visual stimuli, and (2) to provide data for testing a stochastic generalization of the temporal integration model (TI-ED) reported earlier. RT means were found to agree with Bloch's law for durations below 48 msec. By a statistical test, Bloch's law was shown to hold for both means and standard deviations below about 65 msec. Latency statistics-means and standard deviations-were predicted by a Poisson process counting model. This model assumes that a number of identical, parallel Poisson processes, activated by light, with pulse interarrival times decreasing with light intensity, trigger light detection when a critical number of pulses arrive at a counting center. For the intensities investigated, both the estimated number of Poisson processes and critical number of pulses required for detection range between 8 and 13. The model predicts the Broca-Sulzer effect for mean RTs which is observed in several of these experiments.At least two reports, Bruder and Kietzman (1973) and Hildreth (1973), have provided evidence that Bloch's law (BL) holds for RTs for durations less than 16 msec. It was observed in the former to hold when a narrow range of intensities (L to L/4) was used within a given experiment. This is a report of further experimentation with lower light intensities, testing the applicability of BL to RTs to thresholdlevel light stimuli.Secondly, this report proposes a model, the Poisson counting model, of a general class of models first proposed by Luce and Green (1972). As a stochastic generalization of the temporal integration -exponential decay model (TI-ED) presented in Hildreth (1973), the Poisson counting model (1) provides a mechanism for predicting RT means, variances, and detection probabilities; (2) accounts for contextual effects observed in mean RTs: the increase by a constant amount of means to identical stimuli when included in a lower intensity stimulus set; and (3) predicts the Broca-Sulzer effect for RT means, which was observed most clearly in the lowest intensity experiments. METHOD PrCK:edureThe purpose of these three experiments was to investigate RT statistics for near-threshold light intensities.Work on this project was supported in part by a research grant from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. The author thanks John I. Yellott, Jr., for his helpful advice and David LaBerge for the use of his laboratory at the University of Minnesota. The author's address is: West Publishing Co., SO West KelloggBlvd., P.O. Box 3526, St. Paul, Minnesota 55165.Each experimental session consisted of a sequence of simple RT trials, 25OJo of which were catch (no stimulus) trials. Over the remaining 75OJo of the trials, stimulus duration and intensity varied randomly, as described below. Altogether, there were three experiments, corresponding to three different ranges of intensity. Ex...

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Bloch’s law and a temporal integration model for simple reaction time to light

Cited by 23 publications

References 21 publications

Reaction time measurement of temporal integration and organization of form

Reaction time measurement of temporal integration and organization of form

The effect of stimuli that isolate S-cones on early saccades and the gap effect

Bloch’s law and a Poisson counting model for simple reaction time to light

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