Improved visual sensitivity during smooth pursuit eye movements: Temporal and spatial characteristics

Schütz, Alexander C.; Braun, Doris I.; Gegenfurtner, Karl R.

doi:10.1017/s0952523809990083

Cited by 16 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 99 publications

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“…Some observers showed a decrease in performance during pursuit in comparison with during fixation, although the mean difference was not statistically significant ( p = 0.185). This result is inconsistent with the hypothesis that the temporal resolution improvement we found is a result of the general increase in chromatic contrast sensitivity [10], [14]. On the other hand, the result is consistent with the enhanced suppression of motion blur for patterns from the stationary environment.…”

Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

“…However, an alternative interpretation of the present effect is suggested by a recent study by Schütz et al [10], [14]. They found chromatic contrast sensitivity is enhanced during pursuit and ascribed this sensitivity change to an increased contrast gain of parvocellular mechanisms.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 54%

“…It is possible that this increased contrast gain elevates chromatic critical flicker frequency, since the sensitivity enhancement was observed even for a 16.6 Hz flicker [10], and we also observed an increase in fusion frequency when the physical chromatic contrast was raised. In the study by Schütz et al [10], [14], the contrast sensitivity change was observed with non-moving stimuli (flashed horizontal lines). If the general contrast sensitivity enhancement were the main mechanism of increasing chromatic fusion frequency in our experiments, the same effect would be generally observed with stimuli other than the backward background motion.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements Improve Temporal Resolution for Color Perception

et al. 2010

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Human observers see a single mixed color (yellow) when different colors (red and green) rapidly alternate. Accumulating evidence suggests that the critical temporal frequency beyond which chromatic fusion occurs does not simply reflect the temporal limit of peripheral encoding. However, it remains poorly understood how the central processing controls the fusion frequency. Here we show that the fusion frequency can be elevated by extra-retinal signals during smooth pursuit. This eye movement can keep the image of a moving target in the fovea, but it also introduces a backward retinal sweep of the stationary background pattern. We found that the fusion frequency was higher when retinal color changes were generated by pursuit-induced background motions than when the same retinal color changes were generated by object motions during eye fixation. This temporal improvement cannot be ascribed to a general increase in contrast gain of specific neural mechanisms during pursuit, since the improvement was not observed with a pattern flickering without changing position on the retina or with a pattern moving in the direction opposite to the background motion during pursuit. Our findings indicate that chromatic fusion is controlled by a cortical mechanism that suppresses motion blur. A plausible mechanism is that eye-movement signals change spatiotemporal trajectories along which color signals are integrated so as to reduce chromatic integration at the same locations (i.e., along stationary trajectories) on the retina that normally causes retinal blur during fixation.

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Section: Resultscontrasting

confidence: 99%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 54%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 97%

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Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements Improve Temporal Resolution for Color Perception

et al. 2010

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“…This means that the improved sensitivity must be related to following the image rather than to moving the eyes. We further characterized the effect by measuring the temporal impulse response during fixation and pursuit (Schu¨tz et al, 2009b). There was no change in the temporal characteristics but only an increase in the gain of the impulse response during pursuit, indicating a higher sensitivity.…”

Section: Visual Sensitivity During Pursuitmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Interaction Between Vision and Eye Movements

Gegenfurtner

2016

Perception

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The existence of a central fovea, the small retinal region with high analytical performance, is arguably the most prominent design feature of the primate visual system. This centralization comes along with the corresponding capability to move the eyes to reposition the fovea continuously. Past research on visual perception was mainly concerned with foveal vision while the observers kept their eyes stationary. Research on the role of eye movements in visual perception emphasized their negative aspects, for example, the active suppression of vision before and during the execution of saccades. But is the only benefit of our precise eye movement system to provide high acuity of the small foveal region, at the cost of retinal blur during their execution? In this review, I will compare human visual perception with and without saccadic and smooth pursuit eye movements to emphasize different aspects and functions of eye movements. I will show that the interaction between eye movements and visual perception is optimized for the active sampling of information across the visual field and for the calibration of different parts of the visual field. The movements of our eyes and visual information uptake are intricately intertwined. The two processes interact to enable an optimal perception of the world, one that we cannot fully grasp by doing experiments where observers are fixating a small spot on a display.

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“…One of the most prominent differences between magnocellular and parvocellular responses are their temporal impulse response functions (Morrone et al, 2005; Schutz et al, 2009). In particular, the parvocellular neurons have high temporal integration constants and operate as low pass temporal filters.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perception of duration in the parvocellular system

Cicchini¹

2012

Front. Integr. Neurosci.

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Both theoretical and experimental evidence suggests that duration perception is mediated preferentially by the color-blind but high temporally sensitive luminance pathway. In this experiment we tested whether color modulated stimuli and high spatial frequency luminance modulated stimuli, which are known to be relayed mostly by the slow parvocellular system, are able to elicit reliable sense of duration. We show that ramped color modulated stimuli seem to last less than luminance modulated stimuli matched for visibility. The effect is large, about 200 ms and is constant at all durations tested (range 500–1100 ms). However, high spatial frequency luminance stimuli obtain duration matches similar to those of low spatial frequency luminance modulated stimuli. The results at various levels of contrast and temporal smoothing indicate that equiluminant stimuli have higher contrast thresholds to activate the mechanisms which time visual stimuli. Overall the results imply that both the magnocellular and the parvocellular systems access reliably the timing mechanisms with a difference only in the way these are engaged.

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Improved visual sensitivity during smooth pursuit eye movements: Temporal and spatial characteristics

Cited by 16 publications

References 99 publications

Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements Improve Temporal Resolution for Color Perception

Smooth Pursuit Eye Movements Improve Temporal Resolution for Color Perception

The Interaction Between Vision and Eye Movements

Perception of duration in the parvocellular system

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