The McCollough effect reflects permanent and transient adaptation in early visual cortex

The brain encounters input varying with many different time courses. Given such temporal variability, it would seem practical for adaptation to operate at multiple timescales. Indeed, to account for peculiar effects such as spacing, savings, and spontaneous recovery, many recent models of learning a...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of vision (Charlottesville, Va.) Va.), 2008-09, Vol.8 (12), p.4.1-4
Main Authors: Vul, Edward, Krizay, Erin, MacLeod, Donald I A
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adaptation, Physiological
Afterimage - physiology
Color Vision - physiology
Humans
Learning - physiology
Linear Models
Models, Neurological
Time Factors
Visual Cortex - physiology
Young Adult
Citations: Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The brain encounters input varying with many different time courses. Given such temporal variability, it would seem practical for adaptation to operate at multiple timescales. Indeed, to account for peculiar effects such as spacing, savings, and spontaneous recovery, many recent models of learning and adaptation have postulated multiple mechanisms operating at different timescales. However, despite this assumption, and compelling modelling results, different timescales of cortical adaptation and learning are rarely isolated in behaving animals. Here we demonstrate in a series of experiments that early visual cortex adapts at two distinct and separable timescales: fast (saturating with a time constant of roughly 30 seconds) and infinite (a perfect integrator: exhibiting no signs of decay or diminishing returns within the range of intervals tested). We further demonstrate that these two timescales sum linearly and appear to be operating independently and in parallel.
ISSN:1534-7362
1534-7362
DOI:10.1167/8.12.4