Late Development of Cue Integration Is Linked to Sensory Fusion in Cortex

Adults optimize perceptual judgements by integrating different types of sensory information [1, 2]. This engages specialized neural circuits that fuse signals from the same [3–5] or different [6] modalities. Whereas young children can use sensory cues independently, adult-like precision gains from c...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Current biology 2015-11, Vol.25 (21), p.2856-2861
Main Authors: Dekker, Tessa M., Ban, Hiroshi, van der Velde, Bauke, Sereno, Martin I., Welchman, Andrew E., Nardini, Marko
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adult
Attention
Brain - growth & development
Brain Mapping - methods
Cerebral Cortex - growth & development
Cerebral Cortex - physiology
Child
Cues
Depth Perception - physiology
Female
Humans
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted
Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Male
Neural Pathways - growth & development
Neural Pathways - physiology
Perception - physiology
Photic Stimulation
Psychophysics - methods
Vision Disparity - physiology
Visual Cortex - growth & development
Visual Cortex - physiology
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Summary:Adults optimize perceptual judgements by integrating different types of sensory information [1, 2]. This engages specialized neural circuits that fuse signals from the same [3–5] or different [6] modalities. Whereas young children can use sensory cues independently, adult-like precision gains from cue combination only emerge around ages 10 to 11 years [7–9]. Why does it take so long to make best use of sensory information? Existing data cannot distinguish whether this (1) reflects surprisingly late changes in sensory processing (sensory integration mechanisms in the brain are still developing) or (2) depends on post-perceptual changes (integration in sensory cortex is adult-like, but higher-level decision processes do not access the information) [10]. We tested visual depth cue integration in the developing brain to distinguish these possibilities. We presented children aged 6–12 years with displays depicting depth from binocular disparity and relative motion and made measurements using psychophysics, retinotopic mapping, and pattern classification fMRI. Older children (>10.5 years) showed clear evidence for sensory fusion in V3B, a visual area thought to integrate depth cues in the adult brain [3–5]. By contrast, in younger children (
ISSN:0960-9822
1879-0445
DOI:10.1016/j.cub.2015.09.043