PISAVISIONLAB https://www.pisavisionlab.org Research centre dedicated to frontier, interdisciplinary research of human perception Fri, 09 Oct 2026 11:40:52 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.13 Pupillometric signature of implicit learning of statistical regularities https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/08/01/pupillometric-signature-of-implicit-learning-of-statistical-regularities/ Fri, 01 Aug 2025 13:19:39 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5094

]]>

Current Biology Animals learn about the statistical regularities of their environment by a process of implicit learning, a power- ful mechanism that may operate by mere exposure.1 Implicit learning supports processes such as speech acquisition but also learning about the spatial and temporal structure of the world more generally, which is essential for effective interaction.2 Here, we used a frequency-tagging technique to demonstrate a pupillo- metric signature of the learning of the temporal structure (pairing of numerosities) of sequential arrays. Although the numerosity pairings were unnoticed by all participants, the pupil responded clearly to their repe- tition frequency (1 Hz). Pupillometry allowed us to track the learning as it unfolded (the response became sig- nificant after less than 3 min of passive viewing), without ever directing attention to the temporal structure of the stimuli. Diverting attention away from the numerosity feature did not prevent learning, but it did affect the dynamics of the response acquisition. A clear pupillometric response was also elicited by pairing dyads of digits. In all our stimuli, the local features were randomized, implying that learning successfully generalized across stimuli that were locally different and only acquired a temporal structure once their global statistics (overall shape or numerosity) were extracted. Binda P., Terzo C., Turi M., & Burr D.C. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/08/01/pupillometric-signature-of-implicit-learning-of-statistical-regularities/1-s2-0-s0960982225001459-main/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2025.02.011 Local geometry of elementary visual computations https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/local-geometry-of-elementary-visual-computations/ Mon, 05 May 2025 14:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5102 Dott. Peter Neri

Download the flyer

]]> May 5, 2025 @ 14:00 May 5, 2025 @ 17:00 Local geometry of elementary visual computations Dott. Peter Neri Download the flyer How metacognition and higher cognitive functions might shape learning and error assignment https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/how-metacognition-and-higher-cognitive-functions-might-shape-learning-and-error-assignment/ Wed, 02 Jul 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5114 Prof. Aurelio Cortese

Head, dep. Decoded Neurofeedback Computational Neuroscience Laboratories, ATR Institute International, Kyoto – Japan

Download the flyer

]]> July 2, 2025 @ 16:00 July 2, 2025 @ 18:00 How metacognition and higher cognitive functions might shape learning and error assignment Prof. Aurelio Cortese Head, dep. Decoded Neurofeedback Computational Neuroscience Laboratories, ATR Institute International, Kyoto - Japan Download the flyer Generative Phenomenology of form perception: Perceptograms and cortical models for amblyopic form distortions https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/generative-phenomenology-of-form-perception-perceptograms-and-cortical-models-for-amblyopic-form-distortions/ Wed, 09 Jul 2025 16:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5123 Prof. Qasim Zaidi

SUNY Distinguished Professor, Graduate Center for Vision Research, State University of New York, College of Optometry, New York, NY

Download the flyer

]]> July 9, 2025 @ 16:00 July 9, 2025 @ 18:00 Generative Phenomenology of form perception: Perceptograms and cortical models for amblyopic form distortions Prof. Qasim Zaidi SUNY Distinguished Professor, Graduate Center for Vision Research, State University of New York, College of Optometry, New York, NY Download the flyer How the brain adapts to vision loss: perceptual, oculomotor, and cortical reorganization https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/how-the-brain-adapts-to-vision-loss-perceptual-oculomotor-and-cortical-reorganization/ Sat, 06 Sep 2025 16:15:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5148

Prof. MiYoung Kwon

Northeastern University

Download the flyer

]]> September 6, 2025 @ 16:15 September 6, 2025 @ 19:00 How the brain adapts to vision loss: perceptual, oculomotor, and cortical reorganization
Prof. MiYoung Kwon Northeastern University
Download the flyer
Active vision: How eye movements impact vision and vice versa https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/active-vision-how-eye-movements-impact-vision-and-vice-versa/ Thu, 04 Sep 2025 16:30:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5154

Prof. Martin Rolfs

Department of Psychology Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Download the flyer

]]> September 4, 2025 @ 16:30 September 4, 2025 @ 18:30 Active vision: How eye movements impact vision and vice versa
Prof. Martin Rolfs Department of Psychology Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Download the flyer
Continuous tracking of audiovisual motion https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/08/22/continuous-tracking-of-audiovisual-motion-2/ Fri, 22 Aug 2025 08:10:21 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5164 Journal of Vision, 25(10), 10. Multisensory processing is important for studying and understanding typical and atypical development; however, traditional paradigms involve numerous conditions and trials, making sessions long and tedious. A technique referred to as “continuous-tracking” has been introduced which can assess perceptual thresholds in a shorter time. We tested this technique in an audiovisual context by asking participants to track 1-minute audiovisual stimuli moving in a random walk. The stimuli could be visual, auditory, or audiovisual. In the last case, we had a congruent and incongruent condition with a spatiotemporal shift between the two stimuli, so either vision or audition led the walk by a given time. We further modulated the reliability of the visual stimulus to shift the weight toward the audio. We found a straightforward visual dominance regarding motion perception in audiovisual contexts. Regardless of its state, visual information interferes with auditory perception. Moreover, the continuous tracking yielded a new measurement of motion perception, the lag, giving information on the delay between visual and auditory information processing. Indeed, we observed that the tracking of auditory motion lagged relative to visual motion. Tonelli, A., Burr, D., Gori, M., & Alais, D. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/08/22/continuous-tracking-of-audiovisual-motion-2/i1534-7362-25-10-10_1755613426-65435/https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.25.10.10 Color crowding considered as adaptive spatial integration https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/09/01/color-crowding-considered-as-adaptive-spatial-integration/ Mon, 01 Sep 2025 10:14:18 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5187 Journal of Vision, 24(13), 9 Crowding is the inability to recognize an object in clutter, classically considered a fundamental low-level bottleneck to object recognition. Recently, however, it has been suggested that crowding, like predictive phenomena such as serial dependence, may result from optimizing strategies that exploit redundancies in natural scenes. This notion leads to several testable predictions, such as crowding being greater for nonsalient targets and, counterintuitively, that flanker interference should be associated with higher precision in judgements, leading to a lower overall error rate. Here we measured color discrimination for targets flanked by stimuli of variable color. The results verified both predictions, showing that although crowding can affect object recognition, it may be better understood not as a processing bottleneck, but rather as a consequence of mechanisms evolved to efficiently exploit the spatial redundancies of the natural world. Analyses of reaction times of judgments shows that the integration occurs at sensory rather than decisional levels. Cicchini, G. M., D’Errico, G., & Burr, D. C. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/09/01/color-crowding-considered-as-adaptive-spatial-integration/i1534-7362-24-13-9_1733745989-28729/https://doi.org/10.1167/jov.24.13.9 Exogenous Spatial Attention and Expectation: Psychophysical Effects and Pupillometric Dynamics https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/5199/ Mon, 13 Oct 2025 10:30:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5199 Professor Michael A. Grubb

Download the flyer

]]> October 13, 2025 @ 10:30 October 13, 2025 @ 13:00 Exogenous Spatial Attention and Expectation: Psychophysical Effects and Pupillometric Dynamics Professor Michael A. Grubb Download the flyer Acute supplementation of beta-hydroxybutyrate increases visual cortical excitability in humans: a combined Electro-EncephaloGraphy and Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy study https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/acute-supplementation-of-beta-hydroxybutyrateincreasesvisual-cortical-excitability-in-humans-a-combinedelectro-encephalographyand-magnetic-resonancespectroscopy-study/ Wed, 05 Nov 2025 14:20:26 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5213 European Journal of Neuroscience Increasing plasma levels of ketone bodies via supplementation has been recently found to modulate the neurometabolic profilein the healthy human brain. Here, we aimed to explore the physiological consequences of these neurometabolic changes by as-sessing visual cortical function. Ten young adult human volunteers (mean age 27 years, range 23–34) were orally administereda single dose of a β-hydroxybutyrate (βHB) ester (one of the main ketone bodies), and we measured neurometabolic changeafter supplementation. We used Electroencephalography (EEG) to assess cortical responsivity to visual stimuli and endogenousrhythms, and magnetic resonance spectroscopy (MRS) to quantify glutamate and GABA+ concentrations in the occipital cortex.βHB supplementation increased the amplitude of steady-state visual evoked potentials and increased resting-state EEG alphapower (8–13 Hz). These electrophysiological changes were paralleled by an increase in glutamate (but not GABA+) concentrationin the occipital cortex. The glutamate increase was correlated with the increased steady-state visual evoked potentials amplitude.This suggests that acute βHB supplementation increases the excitability of the brain cortex, as assessed neurometabolically andelectrophysiologically. We discuss how these effects of acute supplementation may differ from the long-term effects of chronicinterventions in healthy or pathological brains. Cecilia Steinwurzel, Maria Concetta Morrone, Ele Ferrannini, Francesca Frijia, Domenico Montanaro, Giuseppe Daniele, Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/acute-supplementation-of-beta-hydroxybutyrateincreasesvisual-cortical-excitability-in-humans-a-combinedelectro-encephalographyand-magnetic-resonancespectroscopy-study/eur-j-of-neuroscience-2025-steinwurzel-acute-supplementation-of-beta%e2%80%90hydroxybutyrate-increases-visual-cortical-2/https://doi.org/10.1111/ejn.70270 Short-term monocular deprivation in adult humans: a meta-analysis and new perspectives https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/short-term-monocular-deprivation-in-adult-humans-ameta-analysis-and-new-perspectives/ Wed, 05 Nov 2025 14:36:06 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5216 ["talk"] Vision Sciences Society Few hours of monocular deprivation in adult humans results in a transient shift of ocular dominance in favor of the deprived eye. This robust phenomenon has been investigated with several methodologies in 75 studies since 2011. We compiled a metaanalysis of these studies, structured following the PRISMA checklist and selectively including studies on healthy humans. Each study includes multiple experiments (approximately 180); for each, we computed a standardized effect size and, where possible, we quantified the decay rate of the effect. In the majority of studies, deprivation was achieved by covering one eye with an opaque or a translucent patch, with comparable outcomes (two-sample t(108) = -0.02, p = 0.98). Deprivation effects were mainly measured with three types of tasks: binocular cooperation, binocular competition, and monocular thresholds. Effects are larger when measured with binocular cooperation compared to binocular competition (two-sample t(100) = 4.66, p = 0.001), possibly reflecting different time windows used to report the average effects. Longer periods of deprivation induce larger (r(107) = 0.32, p = 0.001) and longer lasting effects (r(38) = 0.38, p = 0.020). Patching either eye (dominant or nondominant) does not significantly affect the outcome (two-sample t(98) = -0.74, p = 0.46). Effects are seen for both eyes; however, pooling data across studies, we find that opaque patching primarily triggers a suppression of the non-deprived eye, while translucent patching primarily boosts the deprived one (paired t(31) = 2.99, p = 0.005). A growing number of studies show that monocular deprivation effects can be mimicked by manipulations that do not impact the strength of the monocular signal, including degradation of image quality (pink noise, kaleidoscope), image inversion in space or time, or monocular delay. We conclude that the observed shift in eye dominance results from a complex interplay between bottom-up visual stimulation and top-down signals. 20/05/2025 20/05/2025 Cecilia Steinwurzel, Giacomo Pennella , Claudia Lunghi , Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/short-term-monocular-deprivation-in-adult-humans-ameta-analysis-and-new-perspectives/talk_vss-presentation/ Short-term Monocular Deprivation changes Thalamo-Cortical Connectivity measured with ultra-high field fMRI during visual stimulation https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/short-term-monocular-deprivation-changes-thalamo-cortical-connectivity-measured-with-ultra-high-field-fmriduring-visual-stimulation/ Wed, 05 Nov 2025 14:44:39 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5221 ["poster"] Vision Sciences Society In adult humans, brief periods of monocular deprivation induce ocular dominance plasticity, transiently enhancing responses to stimuli in the deprived eye in the primary visual cortex V1 (Binda et al., 2018) and the ventral pulvinar (Kurzawski et al., 2022). Prior work (Acquafredda et al., VSS2023) suggests that these changes are accompanied by a functional reorganization of visual processing circuits, particularly cortico-pulvino-cortical loops, measured in resting-state. Here we investigated how thalamocortical connectivity is modulated by visual stimulation of either eye, before and after deprivation. We acquired ultra-high-field 7T fMRI EPI sequences from 22 normally sighted adults, pre- and post-2 hours of monocular deprivation. Participants were presented with monocular band-pass noise stimuli with five contrast levels. BOLD responses were analyzed for three regions of interest: V1, lateral geniculate nucleus, and pulvinar. Their effective connectivity was assessed by Dynamic Causal Modeling (Tapas toolbox, Frassle et al., 2017). Post-deprivation, V1 evoked responses increased for the deprived eye and decreased for the non-deprived eye, and the modulation was stronger for higher contrast stimuli, consistent with a response gain change. During deprived eye stimulation, pulvinar-to-V1 effective connectivity decreased post-deprivation (like in the resting state) while the V1-pulvinar connectivity remained constant. During stimulation of the non-deprived eye, the opposite connectivity changes were observed. These results suggest that monocular deprivation produces a disconnection between pulvinar and V1, probably decreasing V1 top-down modulation. The mirror-symmetric effect for the non-deprived eye recapitulates the symmetric modulation observed psychophysically. Overall, resting state and visual-evoked results suggest that brief periods of monocular deprivation produce changes in visual processing that extend beyond local V1 processes and may reflect a reorganization of top-down visual influence in V1. 17/05/2025 17/05/2025 Miriam Acquafredda , Cecilia Barachini , Laura Biagi , Michela Tosetti , Maria Concetta Morrone , Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/05/short-term-monocular-deprivation-changes-thalamo-cortical-connectivity-measured-with-ultra-high-field-fmriduring-visual-stimulation/poster_vss-presentation/ Challenges and new approaches to study the control and learning of real-life motor skills https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/challenges-and-new-approaches-to-study-the-control-and-learning-of-real-life-motor-skills/ Thu, 30 Jan 2025 18:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5230

Prof. Andrea D’Avella

Dipartimento di Biologia, Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata

]]> January 30, 2025 @ 18:00 January 30, 2025 @ 19:00 Challenges and new approaches to study the control and learning of real-life motor skills [caption id="attachment_5232" align="alignnone" width="212"] Prof. Andrea D'Avella[/caption] Dipartimento di Biologia, Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata Monocular delay during visually guided actions is as effective as monocular deprivation in driving ocular dominance plasticity https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/18/monocular-delay-during-visually-guided-actions-is-as-effective-as-monocular-deprivation-in-driving-ocular-dominance-plasticity/ Tue, 18 Nov 2025 10:37:22 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5236 Scientific Reports In normally sighted adult volunteers, applying a monocular patch for a few hours produces a short-term shift of ocular dominance in favor of the deprived eye—a phenomenon often interpreted as a form of homeostatic plasticity. We recently showed that the same effect can be elicited without eye-patching, by delaying the image in one eye (by 333 ms) over a 1 h period, during which participants engaged in a visuomotor coordination task; at the end of this period, ocular dominance shifted in favor of the delayed eye. Here we extended these findings, showing that passive exposure to the dichoptic replay of the same video with the same monocular delay did not affect ocular dominance. Moreover, we showed that the ocular dominance shift elicited by monocular delay during goal-directed actions had the same size as the effect of monocular deprivation, achieved by replacing the delayed image with a homogeneous gray screen, and that the two effects were correlated across participants. These results suggest that homeostatic plasticity is gated by a mismatch between vision in one eye and its multimodal context, and it is not necessarily linked with visual deprivation. Cecilia Steinwurzel, Giacomo Pennella, Maria Concetta Morrone, Giulio Sandini, Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/18/monocular-delay-during-visually-guided-actions-is-as-effective-as-monocular-deprivation-in-driving-ocular-dominance-plasticity/monocular_delay_during_visually_guided_actions_is_/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-18464-2 Visual search performance depends on the congruency of olfactory sensations https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/27/visual-search-performance-depends-on-the-congruency-of-olfactory-sensations/ Thu, 27 Nov 2025 15:58:56 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5240 Scientific Reports We here provide evidence for a benefit of congruent olfactory sensations during a challenging visual search task. Using a four-channel olfactometer, we exposed our participants to one of three suprathreshold fruit odorants (lemon, apple, or strawberry) or neutral room air (no odorant) while they searched for an image of a cued-target fruit presented among fruit distractors. Congruent odorants (e.g., exposure to a lemon scent while searching for a lemon among other fruits) led to greater performance levels and faster responses compared to trials where the participants were exposed to an odorant that was incongruent to the searched-for target fruit or to neutral room air, respectively. Post-hoc correlations across our n=22 participants suggest that low performers in the baseline (no-odorant) search task benefited most from the congruent odorant-visual object coupling, whereas the visual search of high performers was impaired most by incongruent couplings. A control task points to large individual differences in olfactory discrimination across our healthy participants and their discriminative ability correlates with the amplitude and sign of the congruency effect. Our findings point to a multisensory congruency effect of odorant processing while participants visually search for a nutritional item among other food choices, suggesting that your nose knows what you are looking for. Serena Castellotti, Marija Soldo, Tina Plank, Maria Del Viva, & Mark Greenlee https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/27/visual-search-performance-depends-on-the-congruency-of-olfactory-sensations/castellotti2025_smell/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-25995-1 Dimensionality reduction techniques in pupillometry research: a primer for behavioral scientists https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/27/dimensionality-reduction-techniques-in-pupillometry-research-a-primer-for-behavioral-scientists/ Thu, 27 Nov 2025 16:06:32 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5243 Behavior Research Methods The measurement of pupil size is a classic tool in psychophysiology, but its popularity has recently surged due to the rapid developments of the eye-tracking industry. Concurrently, several authors have outlined a wealth of strategies for tackling pupillary recordings analytically. The consensus is that the “temporal” aspect of changes in pupil size are key, and that the analytical approach should be mindful of the temporal factor. Here we take a more radical stance on the matter by suggesting that, by the time significant changes in pupil size are detected, it is already too late. We suggest that these changes are indeed the result of distinct, core physiological processes that originate several hundreds of milliseconds before that moment and altogether shape the observed signal. These processes can be recovered indirectly by leveraging on dimensionality reduction techniques. Here we therefore outline key concepts of temporal principal components analysis and related rotations to show that they reveal a latent, low-dimensional space that represents these processes very efficiently: a pupillary manifold. We elaborate on why assessing the pupillary manifold provides an alternative, appealing analytic solution for data analysis. In particular, dimensionality reduction returns scores that are: 1) mindful of the relevant physiology underlying the observed changes in pupil size, 2) extremely handy and manageable for statistical modelling, and 3) devoided of several arbitrary choices. We elaborate on these points in the form of a tutorial paper for the functions provided in the accompanying R library “Pupilla”. Serena Castellotti, Irene Petrizzo, Roberto Arrighi, & Elvio Blini https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/27/dimensionality-reduction-techniques-in-pupillometry-research-a-primer-for-behavioral-scientists/castellotti2025_pupiltoolbox/https://doi.org/10.3758/s13428-025-02786-0 Art-induced psychological well-being: Individual traits shape the beneficial effects of aesthetic experiences https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/11/27/art-induced-psychological-well-being-individual-traits-shape-the-beneficial-effects-of-aesthetic-experiences/ Thu, 27 Nov 2025 16:18:02 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5247 PLOS ONE Since the beginning of the last century, a wide variety of studies have provided evidence of the role of art in improving health and well-being. In this study, we engaged 92 young adults in a guided tour of a contemporary art exhibition, centered around human freedom themes, offering an immersive multi-sensory experience. We aim to discover potential immediate beneficial effects of such aesthetic experience on anxiety, empathy, and compassion, and investigate how these effects relate to visitors’ psychological traits. We also studied whether individual characteristics could explain differences in visitors’ behavioral responses – i.e., visit time and post-visit evaluations. Prior to the experience, we collected participants' information about their art preferences, interests, and expertise, and assessed their psychological traits of curiosity, openness to experience, anxiety, empathy, and compassion. The visit was led by an expert guide, and participants’ behavior was recorded through mobile eye tracking. Standardized self-report scales were administered before and after the visit to measure art-induced benefits on psychological well-being. An ad-hoc post-visit questionnaire, including several dimensions (beauty, understanding, satisfaction, etc.), was finally administered. Results showed that state anxiety decreased following the visit, particularly among visitors with a high trait of anxiety. Empathic and compassionate feelings increased after the visit, particularly among visitors with initially low empathic abilities and low compassion for humanity. Participants with higher curiosity and openness traits tended to spend more time engaging with the artworks and gave overall more positive evaluations. Higher art-related dimensions were linked to stronger emotional reactions and a greater sense of satisfaction and personal enrichment. Our findings provide additional evidence of the impact of art enjoyment on well-being. Art experiences centered around deeply emotional human themes may indeed reduce anxiety and enhance other-oriented feelings. Importantly, psychological traits define clusters of people who may benefit more from experiencing such art exhibitions. Serena Castellotti, Elisa Gragnoli, Giada Baglioni, Roberta Criminisi, Barbara Giangrasso, & Maria Del Viva https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0332321 The pulvinar regulates plasticity in human visual cortex https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/12/16/the-pulvinar-regulates-plasticity-in-human-visual-cortex/ Tue, 16 Dec 2025 09:29:44 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5264 Science Advances In normally sighted human adults, 2 hours of monocular deprivation is sufficient to transiently alter ocular dominance. Here, we show that this is associated with a reduction of functional connectivity between the pulvinar and primary visual cortex (V1), selective for the pulvinar-to- V1 directionality. Across participants, the strength of the pulvinar-to- V1 connectivity was negatively correlated with the ocular dominance shift, implying less plasticity in participants with stronger influence of the pulvinar over V1. Our results support a revised model of adult V1 plasticity, where short-term reorganization is gated by modulatory signals relayed by the pulvinar. Miriam Acquafredda, Jan W. Kurzawski, Laura Biagi, Michela Tosetti, Maria Concetta Morrone, Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2025/12/16/the-pulvinar-regulates-plasticity-in-human-visual-cortex/sciadv-adw9988/https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adw9988 PANORAMA – From tunnel vision to a panorama of human perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/panorama-from-tunnel-vision-to-a-panorama-of-human-perception/ Mon, 20 Apr 2026 11:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5305 Professor Jan W. Kurzawski

Maastricht University Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience

Download the flyer

]]> April 20 @ 11:00 April 20 @ 12:00 PANORAMA – From tunnel vision to a panorama of human perception Professor Jan W. Kurzawski Maastricht University Faculty of Psychology and Neuroscience Download the flyer Adaptation acts directly on the sensory representation of numerosity https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/adaptation-acts-directly-on-the-sensory-representation-of-numerosity/ Wed, 13 May 2026 07:50:04 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5319 Scientific Reports Like most perceptual systems, the perception of numerosity is susceptible to adaptation. However, while adaptation to large numerosities is large and spectacular, obvious on demonstration, adapting to sparse fields (reverse adaptation) causes smaller effects, not readily visible on demonstration, raising the possibility that it may be due to response biases rather than genuine changes to perceptual mechanisms. To investigate this further, we measured adaptation to both dense and sparse dot patterns while simultaneously measuring confidence and reaction times. Both forms of adaptation distorted numerosity estimates in the expected direction, robustly and highly significantly. Importantly, the shifts in perceived numerosity were accompanied by similar shifts in confidence and reaction-time distributions. After adaptation, maximum uncertainty and minima in response-times occurred at the point of subjective (rather than physical) equality of the matching task, suggesting that adaptation acts directly on the sensory representation of numerosity, before the decisional processes. These results reinforce existing evidence for adaption of numerosity, consistent with it being a primary perceptual attribute. A Benedetto, G Anobile, R Arrighi, E Casavecchia, DC Burr https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/adaptation-acts-directly-on-the-sensory-representation-of-numerosity/s41598-026-35068-6/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-35068-6 Human vision maintains a rich representation of objects moving behind an occluder https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/human-visionmaintains-a-richrepresentation-ofobjects-movingbehind-an-occluder/ Wed, 13 May 2026 08:00:52 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5322 Current Biology 36 (5), R185-R186 Vision may seem continuous, but it is frequently disrupted, by internal processes, such as blinks and fast eye-movements, and by external foreground clutter obscuring background objects. Yet when a bicycle passes behind a bush, we maintain a strong sense that it has not vanished, but persists, continuing its unseen motion. Using an indirect probe technique, we show that the visual system maintains, for at least 1 s, a rich perceptual representation of objects moving behind occluders. We created the impression of two disks moving behind a visible occluder, and after 1 s participants judged the colour of a probe disk flashed briefly between their virtual trajectories. The perceived colour of the test was strongly biased towards that of the inducers, showing colour assimilation. Our results show that the visual system maintains, at an early perceptual level, a relatively rich representation of temporally occluded objects, mapping their spatio-temporal trajectories, and storing information about sensory properties such as colour. H Sertakan, DC Burr, GM Cicchini https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/human-visionmaintains-a-richrepresentation-ofobjects-movingbehind-an-occluder/piis0960982226000710/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2026.01.032 Local and global influence of contextual information: insight from auditory and visual speed perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/local-and-global-influence-of-contextual-information-insight-from-auditory-and-visual-speed-perception/ Wed, 13 May 2026 08:07:26 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5327 Royal Society Open Science 13 (4) Accurate perception of speed is essential for adaptive behaviour in dynamic environments, but it is systematically distorted across sensory modalities, making it subject to contextual effects. This study examines the influence of these effects, specifically central tendency and serial dependence, on speed estimation in vision and audition. Participants were asked to rate the speed of visual and auditory stimuli, allowing for a direct comparison of the magnitude of distortion and temporal dynamics across modalities. The results revealed three key findings: (i) central tendency effects were present in both modalities but significantly more pronounced in audition, consistent with greater sensory uncertainty; (ii) serial dependence manifested as an attractive bias towards the previous trial (n−1) in both modalities; (iii) the two effects did not correlate with each other in either modality, indicating distinct processes. Furthermore, the effects of central tendency were positively correlated across modalities, indicating a potential supramodal trait, which is not the case for serial dependence. These results might suggest a dual-process model of contextual integration in speed perception: one governed by long-term statistical learning and another by short-term temporal smoothing. This cross-modal investigation advances our understanding of how the brain stabilizes perceptual estimates under conditions of uncertainty. A Tonelli, DC Burr, D Alais https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/13/local-and-global-influence-of-contextual-information-insight-from-auditory-and-visual-speed-perception/rsos-251839/https://doi.org/10.1098/rsos.251839 Is number a primary perceptual attribute? https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/15/is-number-a-primary-perceptual-attribute/ Fri, 15 May 2026 10:26:55 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5330 i-Perception In this article, I briefly review evidence accumulated over the past two decades that number should be considered a primary perceptual attribute. I concentrate primarily on adaptation studies, but also show how these have been reinforced with other psychophysical methods, as well as pupillometry, EEG and imaging studies. There have been at least two major challenges to number being a primary perceptual attribute, and to adaptation itself, which I discuss. I conclude speculating on the functional role of adaptation to numerosity perception, and suggesting areas requiring further research. David Burr https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/15/is-number-a-primary-perceptual-attribute/burr-2026-is-number-a-primary-perceptual-attribute-_/https://doi.org/10.1177/20416695261423067 Saccade-synchronized alpha rhythms predict strength of memory trace of stimulus orientation https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/26/saccade-synchronized-alpha-rhythms-predict-strength-of-memory-trace-of-stimulus-orientation/ Tue, 26 May 2026 15:40:03 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5334 BMC Biology Background: Saccadic eye movements allow us to sample the world sequentially, but pose challenges to the visual system, which must integrate information across successive fixations. The mechanisms subserving the integration may share properties with "serial dependence", the assimilative bias caused by previous sensory experience on current perception. Results: We investigated serial dependence during saccadic eye movements by measuring ERP responses from participants during visually driven saccadic eye movements while they viewed a brief Gabor patch, presented at various orientations (±35o, ±45o, or ±55o), and then reproduced its orientation. Our findings demonstrate that both alpha and beta oscillations are synchronized by the saccades. Importantly, we found that the strength of alpha oscillations correlates (negatively) with the magnitude of serial dependence, particular in the right parietal cortex, while that of beta oscillations does not. Conclusions: These results provide evidence that presaccadic alpha oscillations contain information to be carried across saccades, probably fundamental for integration of visual information across saccades, and trans-saccadic perceptual stability. Terzo C., Burr D.C., Xie X.,& Morrone M.C. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/05/26/saccade-synchronized-alpha-rhythms-predict-strength-of-memory-trace-of-stimulus-orientation/s12915-026-02609-4_reference/https://doi.org/10.1186/s12915-026-02609-4 Sensorimotor numerosity uniquely supports arithmetic development in children https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/sensorimotor-numerosity-uniquely-supports-arithmetic-development-in-children/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:33:22 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5341 I-Perception, 17(3) Symbolic numerical thinking is a signature human cognition, yet its foundations remain unclear. The prevailing perspective holds that numerical abilities build on a non-symbolic visual number sense that extracts numerosity from the environment. However, recent evidence suggests a sensorimotor number system also tracks the numerosity of internally self-generated actions. Whether this system supports the development of mathematical skills is unknown. In a series of psychophysical tasks, we measured precision (Weber fraction) for estimating, without counting, the number of (i) self-generated hand actions, (ii) visual-temporal flashes, and (iii) dot ensembles. Precision in the action-based numerosity estimation task explained about 30% of the variance in mental calculation ability — three and 15 times higher than spatial and temporal visual numerosity, respectively. This link remained strong even after regressing out the variance explained by natural development (age), verbal and non-verbal reasoning, non-numerical motor abilities, and visual numerosity estimation precision (R2 ≈ 26%). These findings provide the first evidence for a specific link between the sensorimotor number system and mathematical competence, suggesting a foundational role of sensorimotor numerical processes in the development of symbolic human numerical cognition. Anobile, G., Martelli, S., Bieber, E., Tinelli, F., & Ditano, S. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/sensorimotor-numerosity-uniquely-supports-arithmetic-development-in-children/anobile-et-al-2026-sensorimotor-numerosity-uniquely-supports-arithmetic-development-in-children/https://doi.org/10.1177/20416695261443209 Virtual Reality as an Innovative Tool for Numerosity Perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/virtual-reality-as-an-innovative-tool-for-numerosity-perception/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:36:30 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5344 Applied Sciences, 15(7), 3976 Numeracy, the ability to use basic mathematical skills in everyday life, is essential in modern society. Recent studies have shown a connection between numeracy and visual numerosity perception, yet traditional 2D screen-based assessment methods often lack ecological validity and participant engagement. This study evaluates the viability of conducting numerosity estimation tasks in virtual reality (VR) and to determine whether hallmarks of numerosity processing, typically observed in laboratory settings, can be replicated in immersive environments. Six participants completed a psychophysical evaluation in VR, comparing the numerosity of visual stimuli consisting of two sets of spheres. The VR experiment successfully replicated two distinctive patterns found in traditional psychophysical studies: increased precision and decreased response times at high numerosities. Specifically, Weber fractions drop by approximately a factor of two, with values ranging from ~15% for low and intermediate conditions to ~8% in high numerosities, and response times decreases from ~663 ms for low numerosities to ~593 ms for high numerosities. These findings highlight that VR can be effectively used for numerosity estimation tasks, providing a controlled and immersive environment that traditional methods cannot achieve, while significantly expanding methodological possibilities in psychophysical research. Aruanno, B., Anobile, G., Razionale, A. V., Bordegoni, M., & Cicchini, G. M. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/virtual-reality-as-an-innovative-tool-for-numerosity-perception/applsci-15-03976-v2/https://doi.org/10.3390/app15073976 The role of physical and cognitive effort on time perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/the-role-of-physical-and-cognitive-effort-on-time-perception/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:39:40 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5347 Scientific Reports, 15(1), 25595 Action and perception are intertwined, and time perception is not an exception to this general principle. In line with that, we have recently reported that the perceived duration of visual stimuli is extended while running. Here we tested the nature of this phenomenon by contrasting two possibilities: one related to physiological changes induced by physical effort (e.g. heart rate, temperature, arousal), and one related to cognitive alterations linked to motor control. To this aim we compared the direction and magnitude of the temporal bias induced by running to that prompted by other two conditions requiring much lower physical effort but both depleting cognitive resources. In these two conditions, participants either performed the timing task while walking backwards (an attentional motor task) or standing still with cognitive resources divided in a concurrent visual-working memory task. Both conditions yielded temporal overestimations virtually identical to that found while running, suggesting that physical activity could modulate temporal processing through the cognitive effort required to perform/control that specific motor routine. The results are informative for the scientific community investigating time perception in ecological sensorimotor contexts, suggesting the importance of considering the potential confounding role of cognitive factors related to motor execution. Bartolini, T., Petrizzo, I., Arrighi, R., & Anobile, G. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/the-role-of-physical-and-cognitive-effort-on-time-perception/s41598-025-07814-9/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-025-07814-9 Stronger reliance on visual perceptual history in individuals with higher math anxiety. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/stronger-reliance-on-visual-perceptual-history-in-individuals-with-higher-math-anxiety/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:43:05 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5350 BMC Biology, 23(1), 305 Perception is inferential, relying not only on current sensory input but also on prior knowledge. When sensory input is unreliable, history effects such as central tendency and serial dependence smooth out noise by combining previous and current stimuli. These processes support perceptual continuity but also introduce biases, making the current stimulus appear erroneously similar to the previous one. Despite being observed in many perceptual domains, the mechanisms underlying these dynamic processes remain debated. Although perceptual, cognitive, and developmental factors have been studied, the influence of psychological traits has received little attention. In this study, we compared serial dependence and central tendency effects measured with a visual numerosity task across individuals with different levels of math anxiety. Burgio, I., Moscoso, P. A. M., Anobile, G., & Castaldi, E. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/stronger-reliance-on-visual-perceptual-history-in-individuals-with-higher-math-anxiety/s12915-025-02417-2/https://doi.org/10.1186/s12915-025-02417-2 Color-selective numerosity adaptation depends on the automatic categorization of colored information. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/color-selective-numerosity-adaptation-depends-on-the-automatic-categorization-of-colored-information/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:52:08 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5358 iScience, 28(6), 112572 Numerosity perception is subject to adaptation, but this effect is greatly reduced when adaptor and test differ in color. This color-selectivity has been interpreted as evidence of automatic categorization of color-defined numerical information. However, some argue it instead demonstrates the non-numerical nature of numerosity adaptation. According to this idea numerosity adaptation is a byproduct of low-level filtering of spatial and chromatic information. Here, we contrasted these two perspectives by probing numerosity adaptation and its selectivity to color after equating stimuli in terms of their probability to be filtered out and by directly testing the role of categorization mechanisms in the genesis of color-selective adaptation behaviors. Our results confirm that numerosity adaptation does not depend on the filtering out of visual information and suggest that its selectivity for color genuinely reflects the visual system’s ability to automatically parse between categories when these are defined by salient visual attributes like color. Grasso, P. A., Anobile, G., Gurioli, M., Cicchini, G. M., & Arrighi, R. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/color-selective-numerosity-adaptation-depends-on-the-automatic-categorization-of-colored-information/piis2589004225008338/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2025.112572 “Groupitizing”: A Visuo-Spatial and Arithmetic Phenomenon. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/groupitizing-a-visuo-spatial-and-arithmetic-phenomenon/ Fri, 12 Jun 2026 07:54:52 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5361 Open Mind: Discoveries in Cognitive Science, 9, 121–137. When objects are grouped in space, humans can estimate numerosity more precisely than when they are randomly scattered. This phenomenon, called groupitizing, is thought to arise from the interplay of two components: the subitizing system which identifies both the number of subgroups and of items within each group, and the possibility to perform basic arithmetic operations on the subitized groups. Here we directly investigate the relative role of these two components in groupitizing via an interference (dual task) paradigm. Participants were required to estimate numerosities of grouped and ungrouped arrays while their attentional resources were fully available (single task) or while performing concurrent tasks loading auditory or visuo-spatial attention (both known to interfere with the subitizing process) as well as while performing arithmetic calculation. The attentional cost of performing any concurrent task was overall higher for grouped than ungrouped stimuli, supporting the idea that groupitizing relies on the recruitment of more than one attention-dependent mechanism. However, depriving visuo-spatial attention and preventing participants from performing calculations caused the strongest decrement in sensory precision for grouped numerosities indicating that these attentional components play a major role in groupitizing. These results are in line with the existence of an estimation mechanism that might operate across all numerical ranges, supplemented by attentional mechanisms (subitizing). This study shows that this attentional-demanding mechanism can be activated also when processing numerosities outside of the subitizing regime (n > 4), provided that grouping cues are available and, in concert with calculation abilities, gives rise to the groupitizing phenomenon. Maldonado Moscoso, P. A., Anobile, G., Maduli, G., Arrighi, R., & Castaldi, E. https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/06/12/groupitizing-a-visuo-spatial-and-arithmetic-phenomenon/opmi_a_00181/https://doi.org/10.1162/opmi_a_00181 Characterizing Human Disparity Tuning Properties Using Population Receptive Field Mapping https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/characterizing-human-disparity-tuning-properties-using-population-receptive-field-mapping/ Wed, 08 Jul 2026 11:50:11 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5380 The Journal of Neuroscience Our visual percept of small differences in depth is largely informed by binocular stereopsis, the ability to decode depth from the horizontal offset between the retinal images in each eye. While multiple cortical areas are associated with stereoscopic processing, it is unclear how tuning to specific binocular disparities is organized across the human visual cortex. We used 3 T functional magnetic resonance imaging to generate population receptive fields (pRFs) in response to modulation of binocular disparity to characterize the neural tuning to disparity. We also used psychophysics to measure stereoacuity thresholds compared with backgrounds at different depths (pedestal disparity). Ten human participants (seven females) observed correlated or anticorrelated random-dot stereograms with disparity ranging from −0.3 to 0.3°, and responses were modeled as one-dimensional tuning curves along the depth dimension. First, we demonstrate that lateral and dorsal visual areas show the greatest proportion of vertices selective for binocular disparity. Second, with binocularly correlated stimuli, we show a polynomial relationship between preferred disparity and tuning curve width, with sharply tuned disparity responses at near-zero disparities, and broader disparity tuning profiles at near or far disparities. This relationship held across visual areas and was not present for anticorrelated stimuli. Finally, the individual thresholds for psychophysical stereoacuity at the three different pedestal disparities were broadly related to pRF tuning width in area V1, suggesting a possible limit for fine stereopsis at the earliest level of cortical processing. Together, these findings point to heterogeneity of disparity processing across human visual areas, comparable with nonhuman primates. Ivan Alvarez, Alessandro Mancari, I. Betina Ip, Andrew J. Parker and Holly Bridge https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/characterizing-human-disparity-tuning-properties-using-population-receptive-field-mapping/e0795242025-full/https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0795-24.2025 Receptive fields from single-neuron recording and MRI reveal similar information coding for binocular depth https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/receptive-fields-from-single-neuron-recording-and-mri-reveal-similar-information-coding-for-binocular-depth/ Wed, 08 Jul 2026 11:54:42 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5383 PNAS The population receptive field (pRF) approach to functional measurement of the sensory properties of magnetic resonance (MR)-identified locations in the human brain was extended to include the third dimension of binocular depth. In total, pRFs were extracted from nine different visual areas (V1, V2, V3, V3AB, V4, V5, V7, Ventral Occipital Cortex: VOC, Lateral Occipital Cortex: LOC) of the human cortex and, where possible, comparisons were made with electrophysiological recordings from homologous areas in the macaque cortex. Human and macaque V1 showed strikingly similar information profiles for the encoding of binocular depth. Further, both human and macaque V5 showed consistent changes in preferred binocular depth of the stimulus, dependent on whether the stimuli were binocularly correlated or anticorrelated. Across the nine areas of the visual cortex explored, the population profiles of pRFs for binocular depth showed evidence of a greater responsiveness to relative depth in higher visual cortical areas, again consistent with the findings from macaque electrophysiology. Overall, the pRF measures of cortical response were more sensitive to fine-scale differences of binocular depth, compared with many existing electrophysiological measures of tuning for binocular depth. Our results show that the pRF method can be extended beyond the characterization of RFs in retinotopic coordinates to reveal higher-order, derived visual properties. The parallels between noninvasive, MR-based measures of pRFs in humans and the electrophysiological recordings of single neurons in experimental animals make a further step toward validation of the pRF methodology. Andrew J. Parker, Ivan Alvarez, Alessandro Mancari, I. Betina Ip, Kristine Krug, and Holly Bridge https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/receptive-fields-from-single-neuron-recording-and-mri-reveal-similar-information-coding-for-binocular-depth/parker-et-al-2025-receptive-fields-from-single-neuron-recording-and-mri-reveal-similar-information-coding-for-binocular/https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2409893122 No aftereffect of motor duration production on auditory duration perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/no-aftereffect-of-motor-duration-production-on-auditory-duration-perception/ Wed, 08 Jul 2026 12:00:39 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5386 Scientific Reports Adaptation to stimulus duration causes a repulsive aftereffect on the perceived duration of subsequent stimuli. Most studies investigating duration adaptation have found that the effect is confined to the adapted modality, highlighting unimodal components of duration processing. Here, we use adaptation to test whether motor and auditory duration processing rely on partially shared neural mechanisms by looking for a transfer of the duration aftereffect between these modalities. We asked participants to estimate the perceived duration of auditory stimuli following auditory or motor adaptation. While we replicated the unimodal effects of auditory adaptation, we report that motor adaptation did not produce the typical repulsive aftereffect. We interpret this result as evidence that duration processing by the motor and auditory systems is based on independent mechanisms. Alessandro Mancari & Maria Concetta Morrone https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/08/no-aftereffect-of-motor-duration-production-on-auditory-duration-perception/s41598-026-59220-4_reference/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-59220-4 Short-term monocular deprivation in healthy humans: a meta-analysis and new perspectives https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/09/short-term-monocular-deprivation-in-healthy-humans-a-meta-analysis-and-new-perspectives/ Thu, 09 Jul 2026 09:49:21 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5389 Royal Society Starting from the early 2010s, several studies have shown that a short period of monocular deprivation in adult volunteers transiently shifts ocular dominance in favour of the deprived eye. We compiled a meta-analysis of 73 such studies and found that the shift of ocular dominance was reliably observed, although with variable effect sizes mainly associated with the duration of deprivation and the technique used for measuring ocular dominance. By contrast, the effect was remarkably stable across experimental designs (translucent versus light-tight patching of the dominant versus non-dominant eye). A qualitatively similar effect was also elicited without deprivation, by distorting the monocular image or making it task irrelevant. These results offer insights into the mechanisms underlying the ocular dominance shift, which we discuss in the light of current models and a new perspective inspired by predictive coding. This line of research allows for a new understanding of the plasticity of early visual processing, which perdures well after the end of developmental critical periods and may be used to promote recovery of visual functions. Cecilia Steinwurzel, Giacomo Pennella, Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/09/short-term-monocular-deprivation-in-healthy-humans-a-meta-analysis-and-new-perspectives/rspb-2025-2487/https://doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2025.2487 Visually guided voluntary actions boost short-term ocular dominance plasticity https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/09/visually-guided-voluntary-actions-boost-short-term-ocular-dominance-plasticity/ Thu, 09 Jul 2026 10:19:35 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5392 Scientific Reports Short-term monocular deprivation transiently shifts ocular dominance in favor of the deprived eye. Here we asked whether the effect of a one-hour monocular deprivation was enhanced by the execution of a task requiring visually guided goal-directed actions, compared to a passive viewing condition where participants watched a replay of their own actions. Although the visual input was the same across conditions, we found a stronger ocular dominance shift when participants actively performed the task. These results provide strong evidence that voluntary, goal-directed actions modulate visual plasticity. Cecilia Steinwurzel, Giacomo Pennella, Maria Concetta Morrone, Giulio Sandini & Paola Binda https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/09/visually-guided-voluntary-actions-boost-short-term-ocular-dominance-plasticity/s41598-026-51966-1/https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-026-51966-1 MEYELens: An Affordable, Open-Source, 3D-Printable Eyewear Platform for Pupillometry and Gaze Tracking https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/meyelens-an-affordabel-open-source-3d-printable-eyewear-platform-for-pupillometry-and-gaze-tracking/ Thu, 23 Jul 2026 04:34:48 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5401 Behavior Research Methods (in press.) Pupillometry and gaze tracking provide sensitive, non-invasive indices of autonomic function and cognitive state and are increasingly employed in neuroscience and clinical research. However, commonly used systems remain costly and often constrain hardware customization and workflow transparency. MEYELens is presented as an open-source, fully 3D-printable wearable system for low-cost pupillometry and gaze tracking using readily available components. The design is modular and mechanically adjustable to accommodate different users and experimental requirements. An open pipeline is provided for data acquisition and for both offline and online analysis. Feasibility is demonstrated across frequency-based and task-evoked pupillary paradigms and gaze mapping is shown to operate in both screen-based and naturalistic settings. By combining affordability, modular hardware, and open software, MEYELens reduces barriers to reliable eye-based measurement and supports methodological development in resource-constrained research contexts. G. Vecchieschi, L.Ingenito, A. Benedetto, C. Luciani, F. Carrara, G. Cioni, A. Guzzetta, T. Pizzorusso, L. Baroncelli, R. M. Mazziotti Late cortical dynamics mediate numerosity illusions induced by symmetry https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/late-cortical-dynamics-mediate-numerosity-illusions-induced-by-symmetry/ Thu, 23 Jul 2026 04:40:36 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5405 Communications Biology Numerosity perception enables us to quickly estimate the number of objects in a visual scene, a fundamental skill supporting efficient interaction with the environment. In this study, we tracked how the human brain transforms physical inputs into numerical percepts. Using EEG, we characterized the temporal dynamics of how numerosity-related signals are integrated with spatial configuration cues that shape perception. We leveraged on a visual illusion in which dot arrays appear less numerous when arranged symmetrically rather than randomly. Participants viewed dot arrays of varying physical or perceived numerosity, illusorily altered by the dots’ spatial arrangement. Both univariate and multivariate analyses revealed that physical numerosity was decodable from occipitoparietal electrodes as early as ~50 ms after stimulus onset, independently of low-level features such as convex hull, density, individual and total item area. Spatial arrangement was represented later, from ~150 ms, and perceived numerosity, biased by symmetry-induced grouping, emerged at a similar latency. These results indicate that early neural signals encode physical numerosity directly, whereas the symmetry-induced underestimation arises from late grouping processes, such as those involved in incremental grouping, supporting object segmentation. A. Benedetto, R. Arrighi, E. Castaldi https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/late-cortical-dynamics-mediate-numerosity-illusions-induced-by-symmetry/s42003-026-10746-3_reference/https://doi.org/10.1038/s42003-026-10746-3 Speed of Visual Processing Across the Visual Field https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/speed-of-visual-processing-across-the-visual-field/ Thu, 23 Jul 2026 04:42:49 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5407 Current Opinion in Neurobiology, 100, 103247 Despite the phenomenological experience of vision being stable and uniform in both space and time, our visual system constructs this representation from markedly inhomogeneous spatial and temporal structures. While considerable progress has been made in understanding the inhomogeneities in spatial vision, much less attention has been given to the inhomogeneities in the temporal dynamics of vision. Specifically, little is known about how speed of processing varies across the visual field. In this non-systematic review, we focus primarily on psychophysical and neurophysiological studies of low-level photopic vision to elucidate how the speed of visual processing changes with eccentricity. Specifically, we examine key findings from major investigations on this topic, highlighting areas of convergence, points of divergence, and aspects that remain unresolved. A. Benedetto, M.Poletti https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/speed-of-visual-processing-across-the-visual-field/1-s2-0-s0959438826000838-main/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.conb.2026.103247 Altered cortical synchronization in photosensitive idiopathic generalized epilepsy https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/07/23/altered-cortical-synchronization-in-photosensitive-idiopathic-generalized-epilepsy/ Thu, 23 Jul 2026 04:46:15 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5409 Epilepsia (in press) Objective: To characterize cortical excitability and synchronization dynamics in patients with idiopathic generalized epilepsy (IGE) and photosensitivity by assessing steady-state visual evoked potentials (SSVEPs) elicited by intermittent photic stimulation. Methods: SSVEPs were recorded from the occipital cortex (Oz) in patients with IGE and photoparoxysmal response and in age-matched healthy subjects (HS) during stimulation at 8 and 16 Hz, with eyes open and closed. We analyzed evoked (phase-locked) and induced (non–phase-locked) responses, inter-trial phase clustering (ITPC), broadband EEG energy, and resting-state spectral and alpha-peak dynamics. Results: Compared with HS, patients showed consistently greater EEG energy at stimulation frequencies and across the broadband spectrum, particularly for induced SSVEP responses. Despite this increased amplitude, patients exhibited reduced phase coherence, reflected by significantly lower ITPC across all conditions. Resting-state analyses revealed heightened broadband power but unstable alpha oscillations, with greater variability in individual alpha peak frequency. Together, these findings indicate enhanced cortical responsiveness accompanied by impaired temporal precision in neural synchronization. Significance: Photosensitive IGE is characterized not only by exaggerated visual cortical excitability but also by disrupted synchronization dynamics, suggesting a state of strong but temporally unstable neural activity that may facilitate transitions toward photically induced paroxysms. SSVEP-based measures and alpha- variability metrics may serve as functional biomarkers of network instability in photosensitive epilepsy Benedetto, A., Steinwurzel, C.; Turco, F.; Bonanni, E.; Cantello, R.; Strigaro, G. Numerosity Adaptation Across Size Transformations https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/09/numerosity-adaptation-across-size-transformations/ Wed, 09 Sep 2026 13:31:25 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5420 Scientific Reports Numerosity adaptation occurs across sensory modalities and formats, pointing to an abstract and amodal numerosity coding. Recent findings, however, suggest that it may also be shaped by non-numerical visual properties and perceptual categorization. Here, we examined stimulus size because size variations can be interpreted either as feature differences between stimuli or as scale transformations of the same object viewed from different distances. Across two experiments, participants performed a numerosity discrimination task following adaptation to highly numerous dot arrays. In Experiment 1, adaptor and test stimuli consisted of either small or large dots, yielding congruent trials when their size was identical and incongruent trials when it differed. Numerosity adaptation was stronger in congruent than in incongruent trials, indicating that dot size modulates adaptation magnitude, similarly to other visual stimulus properties. In Experiment 2, adaptor size changed dynamically, mimicking the looming-receding motion in depth and promoting object continuity across size transformations. Dynamic size changes did not eliminate the size-dependent modulation of numerosity adaptation. Instead, salient changes in several non-numerical features significantly interact with numerosity processing, shaping aftereffect magnitude. Overall, these findings indicate that numerosity adaptation is a multifaceted phenomenon arising from interactions among numerical information, low-level visual properties, and visual temporal dynamics. Serena Castellotti, Letizia Ingenito, Elisa Castaldi, Roberto Arrighi https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/09/numerosity-adaptation-across-size-transformations/castellotti2026_looming/https://doi.org/10.1038/ s41598-026-67458-1 Quantum spin models for numerosity perception https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/quantum-spin-models-for-numerosity-perception/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 08:14:22 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5425 PLOS ONE Humans share with animals, both vertebrates and invertebrates, the capacity to sense the number of items in their environment already at birth. The pervasiveness of this skill across the animal kingdom suggests that it should emerge in very simple populations of neurons. Current modelling literature, however, has struggled to provide a simple architecture carrying out this task, with most proposals suggesting the emergence of number sense in multi-layered complex neural networks, and typically requiring supervised learning; while simple accumulator models fail to predict Weber’s Law, a common trait of human and animal numerosity processing. We present a simple quantum spin model with all-to-all connectivity, where numerosity is encoded in the spectrum after stimulation with a number of transient signals occurring in a random or orderly temporal sequence. We use a paradigmatic simulational approach borrowed from the theory and methods of open quantum systems out of equilibrium, as a possible way to describe information processing in neural systems. Our method is able to capture many of the perceptual characteristics of numerosity in such systems. The frequency components of the magnetization spectra at harmonics of the system’s tunneling frequency increase with the number of stimuli presented. The amplitude decoding of each spectrum, performed with an ideal-observer model, reveals that the system follows Weber’s law. This contrasts with the well-known failure to reproduce Weber’s law with linear system or accumulators models. Yago Malo J, Cicchini GM, Morrone MC, Chiofalo ML https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/quantum-spin-models-for-numerosity-perception/journal-pone-0284610/https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0284610 Development of BOLD Response to Motion in Human Infants https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/development-of-bold-response-to-motion-in-human-infants/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 08:23:20 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5428 The Journal of Neuroscience Behavioral studies suggest that motion perception is rudimentary at birth and matures steadily over the first few years. We demonstrated previously that the major cortical associative areas serving motion processing, like middle temporal complex (MT+), visual cortex area 6 (V6), and PIVC in adults, show selective responses to coherent flow in 8-week-old infants. Here, we study the BOLD response to the same motion stimuli in 5-week-old infants (four females and four males) and compare the maturation between these two ages. The results show that MT+ and PIVC areas show a similar motion response at 5 and 8 weeks, whereas response in the V6 shows a reduced BOLD response to motion at 5 weeks, and cuneus associative areas are not identifiable at this young age. In infants and in adults, primary visual cortex (V1) does not show a selectivity for coherent motion but shows very fast development between 5 and 8 weeks of age in response to the appearance of motion stimuli. Resting-state correlations demonstrate adult-like functional connectivity between the motion-selective associative areas but not between primary cortex and temporo-occipital and posterior-insular cortices. The results are consistent with a differential developmental trajectory of motion area respect to other occipital regions, probably reflecting also a different development trajectory of the central and peripheral visual field. SIGNIFICANCE STATEMENT How the cortical visual areas attain the specialization that we observed in human adults in the first few months of life is unknown. However, this knowledge is crucial to understanding the consequence of perinatal brain damage and its outcome. Here, we show that motion selective areas are already functioning well in 5-week-old infants with greater responses for detecting coherent motion over random motion, suggesting that very little experience is needed to attain motion selectivity. Laura Biagi, Michela Tosetti, Sofia Allegra Crespi and Maria Concetta Morrone https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/development-of-bold-response-to-motion-in-human-infants/3825-full/https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.0837-22.2023 The duration effect of short-term monocular deprivation measured by binocular rivalry and binocular combination https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/the-duration-effect-of-short-term-monocular-deprivation-measured-by-binocular-rivalry-and-binocular-combination/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 08:30:19 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5431 Vision Research The ocular dominance shift observed after short-term monocular deprivation is a widely used measure of visual homeostatic plasticity in adult humans. Binocular rivalry and binocular combination techniques are used interchangeably to characterize homeostatic plasticity, sometimes leading to contradictory results. Here we directly compare the effect of short-term monocular deprivation on ocular dominance measured by either binocular rivalry or binocular combination and its dependence on the duration of deprivation (15 or 120 min) in the same group of participants. Our results show that both binocular rivalry and binocular combination provide reliable estimates of ocular dominance, which are strongly correlated across techniques both before and after deprivation. Moreover, while 15 min of monocular deprivation induce a larger shift of ocular dominance when measured using binocular combination compared to binocular rivalry, for both techniques, the shift in ocular dominance exhibits a strong dependence on the duration of monocular deprivation, with longer deprivation inducing a larger and longer-lasting shift in ocular dominance. Taken together, our results indicate that both binocular rivalry and binocular combination offer very consistent and reliable measurements of both ocular dominance and the effect short-term monocular deprivation. Antoine Prosper, Martina Pasqualetti, Maria Concetta Morrone, Claudia Lunghi https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/the-duration-effect-of-short-term-monocular-deprivation-measured-by-binocular-rivalry-and-binocular-combination/1-s2-0-s0042698923001025-main/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.visres.2023.108278 Development of Higher-Level Vision: A Network Perspective https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/development-of-higher-level-vision-a-network-perspective/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 08:48:12 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5434 The Journal of Neuroscience Most studies on the development of the visual system have focused on the mechanisms shaping early visual stages up to the level of primary visual cortex (V1). Much less is known about the development of the stages after V1 that handle the higher visual functions fundamental to everyday life. The standard model for the maturation of these areas is that it occurs sequentially, according to the positions of areas in the adult hierarchy. Yet, the existing literature reviewed here paints a different picture, one in which the adult configuration emerges through a sequence of unique network configurations that are not mere partial versions of the adult hierarchy. In addition to studying higher visual development per se to fill major gaps in knowledge, it will be crucial to adopt a network-level perspective in future investigations to unravel normal developmental mechanisms, identify vulnerabilities to developmental disorders, and eventually devise treatments for these disorders. James A. Bourne, Radoslaw M. Cichy, Lynne Kiorpes, Maria Concetta Morrone, Michael J. Arcaro and Kristina J. Nielsen https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/development-of-higher-level-vision-a-network-perspective/e1291242024-full/https://doi.org/10.1523/JNEUROSCI.1291-24.2024 Impairment in understanding grasping movements in egocentric and allocentric perspectives in children with cerebral palsy due to periventricular leukomalacia https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/impairment-in-understanding-grasping-movements-in-egocentric-and-allocentric-perspectives-in-children-with-cerebral-palsy-due-to-periventricular-leukomalacia/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 08:56:59 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5437 Human Movement Science Recognizing and understanding the actions of others through motion information are vital functions for social adaptation. Conditions like neurological disorders and motor impairments can impact sensitivity to biological motion, highlighting the intricate relationship between perceiving and executing movements. Our study centred on assessing the ability of children, encompassing both those with typical development and those diagnosed with cerebral palsy due to periventricular leukomalacia (PVL), to discriminate between depicted grasping of a small cylinder and a large cube. This discrimination task involved observing a point-light animation depicting an actor grasping the object, presented from either an allocentric perspective (observing others) or an egocentric viewpoint (observing oneself). Notably, children with PVL exhibited a pronounced and specific impairment in this task, irrespective of the viewpoint, as evidenced by thresholds increasing by nearly a factor of two. When comparing this impairment to difficulties in form or motion perception, we identified a robust correlation between egocentric biological motion and form sensitivity. However, there was no similar correlation between motion and biological motion sensitivity, suggesting a deficit in the visual system rather than the visuo-motor control system. These findings contribute to our understanding of the intricate interplay between motor and visual processing in individuals with congenital brain lesions, shedding light on the significant involvement of the visual system in cases of PVL. Francesca Tinelli, Giulia Purpura, Giovanni Cioni, Maria Concetta Morrone, Marco Turi https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/impairment-in-understanding-grasping-movements-in-egocentric-and-allocentric-perspectives-in-children-with-cerebral-palsy-due-to-periventricular-leukomalacia/1-s2-0-s0167945724001179-main/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.humov.2024.103292 Harnessing brain plasticity to improve binocular vision in amblyopia: An evidence-based update https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/harnessing-brain-plasticity-to-improve-binocular-vision-in-amblyopia-an-evidence-based-update/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 09:04:46 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5440 European Journal of Ophthalmology Amblyopia is a developmental visual disorder resulting from atypical binocular experience in early childhood that leads to abnormal visual cortex development and vision impairment. Recovery from amblyopia requires significant visual cortex neuroplasticity, i.e. the ability of the central nervous system and its synaptic connections to adapt their structure and function. There is a high level of neuroplasticity in early development and, historically, neuroplastic responses to changes in visual experience were thought to be restricted to a “critical period” in early life. However, as our review now shows, the evidence is growing that plasticity of the adult visual system can also be harnessed to improve vision in amblyopia. Amblyopia treatment involves correcting refractive error to ensure clear and equal retinal image formation in both eyes, then, if necessary, promoting the use of the amblyopic eye by hindering or reducing visual input from the better eye through patching or pharmacologic therapy. Early treatment in children can lead to visual acuity gains and the development of binocular vision in some cases; however, many children do not respond to treatment, and many adults with amblyopia have historically been untreated or undertreated. Here we review the current evidence on how dichoptic training can be used as a novel binocular therapeutic approach to facilitate visual processing of input from the amblyopic eye and can simultaneously engage both eyes in a training task that requires binocular integration. It is a novel and promising treatment for amblyopia in both children and adults. Benjamin Thompson, Maria Concetta Morrone, Peter Bex, Anthony Lozama and Bernhard A. Sabel https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/harnessing-brain-plasticity-to-improve-binocular-vision-in-amblyopia-an-evidence-based-update/thompson-et-al-2023-harnessing-brain-plasticity-to-improve-binocular-vision-in-amblyopia-an-evidence-based-update/https://doi.org/10.1177/11206721231187426 Primary visual cortex BOLD responses to relative localization of sounds at 7T https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/primary-visual-cortex-bold-responses-to-relative-localization-of-sounds-at-7t/ Thu, 10 Sep 2026 09:24:02 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?p=5443 iScience To clarify the computational role and dynamics of auditory-driven cross-modal activations in visual cortices, we investigated the recruitment of the primary visual cortex (V1) during auditory spatial perception using fMRI and dynamic causal modeling (DCM). Ten participants estimated the relative position of sounds with respect to two spatial landmarks. We found significant activation of V1 in response to the sound to localize, along with bilateral activation in the primary auditory cortex (A1) and intraparietal sulcus (IPS; pFWE < 0.001). Moreover, we observed task-dependent changes in the effective connectivity between V1, A1, and IPS: in particular, the coupling between A1 to IPS, as well as from IPS to V1 increased positively. This study suggests that judgments of the relative distance between sounds elicit activity in V1, and V1 recruitment is likely explained by an increased effective connectivity from IPS. This network may support the brain ability to perform high-level spatial computations in the auditory domain. M. Riberto, M.B. Amadeo, A. Inuggi, M. Costagli, C. Campus, M. Gori and M.C. Morrone https://www.pisavisionlab.org/2026/09/10/primary-visual-cortex-bold-responses-to-relative-localization-of-sounds-at-7t/piis2589004226014501/https://doi.org/10.1016/j.isci.2026.116075 During smooth pursuit, objects are perceived as they appear on the retina https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/during-smooth-pursuit-objects-are-perceived-as-they-appear-on-the-retina/ Thu, 08 Oct 2026 17:15:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5451 Prof. Dr. Markus Lappe

Download the flyer

]]> October 8 @ 17:15 October 8 @ 18:15 During smooth pursuit, objects are perceived as they appear on the retina Prof. Dr. Markus Lappe Download the flyer Prediction in oculomotor processes: Transsaccadic feature perception and conditioned pupillary response https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/prediction-in-oculomotor-processes-transsaccadic-feature-perception-and-conditioned-pupillary-response/ Mon, 14 Sep 2026 17:30:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5457 Dr. Nino Sharvashidze

Download the flyer

]]> September 14 @ 17:30 September 14 @ 18:30 Prediction in oculomotor processes: Transsaccadic feature perception and conditioned pupillary response Dr. Nino Sharvashidze Download the flyer Music, Prediction and the Brain https://www.pisavisionlab.org/event/music-prediction-and-the-brain/ Thu, 15 Oct 2026 12:00:00 +0000 https://www.pisavisionlab.org/?post_type=tribe_events&p=5463 Professor Robert Zatorre
Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada; International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Montréal, Québec, Canada
The Predictive Brain: From Perception to Pleasure in Music

Professor Virginia Penhune
Department of Psychology, Concordia University
Prediction and Groove: Why Music Makes Us Want to Move

Download the flyer

]]> October 15 @ 12:00 October 15 @ 17:15 Music, Prediction and the Brain Professor Robert Zatorre Montreal Neurological Institute, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, Canada; International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research (BRAMS), Montréal, Québec, Canada The Predictive Brain: From Perception to Pleasure in Music Professor Virginia Penhune Department of Psychology, Concordia University Prediction and Groove: Why Music Makes Us Want to Move Download the flyer