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Hearing Research Jul 2022Modulated maskers produce less amount of masking than unmodulated maskers, an effect referred to as masking release (MR). Both listening in the temporal dips and fast...
Modulated maskers produce less amount of masking than unmodulated maskers, an effect referred to as masking release (MR). Both listening in the temporal dips and fast cochlear compression have been suggested as underlying mechanisms. We addressed the role of dip listening by measuring temporal integration in simultaneous masking using Schroeder-phase harmonic complexes (SPHC) with various phase curvatures. In an experiment with six normal-hearing listeners, SPHC masker and pure-tone target stimuli were covaried in duration at a high masker level. The MR increased with stimulus duration, suggesting integration of target information across multiple masker dips. The duration dependence of the MR was predicted by a physiology-inspired model based on the temporal envelope modulation strength in the auditory periphery. The modeling analysis suggested that listeners detect the presence of the target by a reduction in fluctuation strength that results primarily from a decline of F0-based response peaks, an effect known as synchrony capture. The detailed pattern of masked thresholds across various masker phase curvatures was not predicted by the model, suggesting that its phase response does not well fit the human phase response. Overall, temporal integration across neural envelope features associated with the masker dips seems to contribute to the MR with SPHCs.
Topics: Acoustic Stimulation; Auditory Perception; Auditory Threshold; Cochlea; Humans; Perceptual Masking
PubMed: 35609445
DOI: 10.1016/j.heares.2022.108514 -
Journal of Vision Nov 2007Two of the strongest tools to manipulate visual awareness of potentially salient stimuli are binocular rivalry and dichoptic masking. Binocular rivalry is induced by...
Two of the strongest tools to manipulate visual awareness of potentially salient stimuli are binocular rivalry and dichoptic masking. Binocular rivalry is induced by presenting incompatible images to the two eyes over prolonged periods of time, leading to an alternating perception of the two images. Dichoptic masking is induced when two images are presented once in rapid succession, leading to the perception of just one of the images. Although these phenomena share some key characteristics, most notably the ability to erase from awareness potentially very salient stimuli, their relationship is poorly understood. We investigated the perceptual dynamics during long-lasting dynamic stimulation leading to binocular rivalry or dichoptic masking. We show that the perceptual dynamics during dichoptic masking conditions meet the classifiers used to classify a process as binocular rivalry; that is, (1) Levelt's 2nd proposition is obeyed; (2) perceptual dominance durations follow a gamma distribution; and (3) dominance durations are sequentially independent. We suggest that binocular rivalry and dichoptic masking may be mediated by the same inhibitory mechanisms.
Topics: Humans; Perceptual Masking; Photic Stimulation; Vision Disparity; Vision, Binocular; Visual Perception
PubMed: 18217798
DOI: 10.1167/7.14.3 -
Psychonomic Bulletin & Review Oct 2013Object substitution masking (OSM) occurs when a sparse (e.g., four-dot), temporally trailing mask obscures the visibility of a briefly presented target. Here, we review... (Review)
Review
Object substitution masking (OSM) occurs when a sparse (e.g., four-dot), temporally trailing mask obscures the visibility of a briefly presented target. Here, we review theories of OSM: those that propose that OSM reflects the interplay between feedforward and feedback/reentrant neural processes, those that predict that feedforward processing alone gives rise to the phenomenon, and theories that focus on cognitive explanations, such as object updating. We discuss how each of these theories accommodates key findings from the OSM literature. In addition, we examine the relationship between OSM and other visual-cognitive phenomena, including object correspondence through occlusion, change blindness, metacontrast masking, backward masking, and visual short-term memory. Finally, we examine the level of processing at which OSM impairs target perception. Collectively, OSM appears to reflect the conditions under which the brain confuses two visual events for one when they are encoded with low spatiotemporal resolution, due to processing resources being otherwise occupied.
Topics: Attention; Consciousness; Humans; Perceptual Masking; Psychological Theory
PubMed: 23417271
DOI: 10.3758/s13423-013-0400-9 -
Advances in Experimental Medicine and... 2016As our understanding of directly observable effects from anthropogenic sound exposure has improved, concern about "unobservable" effects such as stress and masking have... (Review)
Review
As our understanding of directly observable effects from anthropogenic sound exposure has improved, concern about "unobservable" effects such as stress and masking have received greater attention. Equal energy models of masking such as power spectrum models have the appeal of simplicity, but do they offer biologically realistic assessments of the risk of masking? Data relevant to masking such as critical ratios, critical bandwidths, temporal resolution, and directional resolution along with what is known about general mammalian antimasking mechanisms all argue for a much more complicated view of masking when making decisions about the risk of masking inherent in a given anthropogenic sound exposure scenario.
Topics: Animals; Models, Theoretical; Perceptual Masking; Risk Factors
PubMed: 26610979
DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4939-2981-8_42 -
Consciousness and Cognition Sep 2018Saccades rapidly jerk the eye into new positions, yet we rarely experience the motion streaks imposed on the retinal image. Here we examined spatial and temporal...
Saccades rapidly jerk the eye into new positions, yet we rarely experience the motion streaks imposed on the retinal image. Here we examined spatial and temporal properties of post-saccadic masking-one potential explanation of this perceptual omission. Observers judged the motion direction of a target stimulus, a Gaussian blob, that moved vertically upwards or downwards and then back to its initial position, just as observers made a saccade. We manipulated the onset and offset of the target and of distractors in various spatial relations to the target, and assessed their effect on performance and subjective confidence. Although the presence of the target after the saccade caused the strongest omission, the offset of spatially distant distractor stimuli upon saccade offset also impaired performance. The temporal properties of these two separate effects suggest that, in addition to masking, an independent effect of attentional distraction further accentuates perceptual omission of intra-saccadic motion streaks.
Topics: Humans; Motion Perception; Perceptual Masking; Saccades; Space Perception
PubMed: 29789209
DOI: 10.1016/j.concog.2018.05.004 -
Journal of Vision Oct 2009Visual backward masking is a commonly used technique in vision research and psychology. There are two distinct types of masking. Either masking is strongest for a...
Visual backward masking is a commonly used technique in vision research and psychology. There are two distinct types of masking. Either masking is strongest for a simultaneous presentation of the target and the mask (A-type masking) or masking is strongest when the mask trails the target (B-type masking). To account for the two types of masking, a variety of explanations have been put forward that often rely on low-level features such as the target-mask energy ratio. However, recent studies have demonstrated that the global spatial layout of the mask is an equally important factor. Here, we investigated both factors jointly. Our findings show that both factors strongly interact with each other and that neither one alone can explain the results. This finding indicates that choosing a mask should not be taken lightly when masking is used as a tool to investigate properties of perception or cognition.
Topics: Humans; Lighting; Perceptual Masking; Photic Stimulation; Psychophysics; Visual Perception
PubMed: 20053085
DOI: 10.1167/9.11.22 -
Attention, Perception & Psychophysics Jul 2016Visual masking and attention have been known to control the transfer of information from sensory memory to visual short-term memory. A natural question is whether these...
Visual masking and attention have been known to control the transfer of information from sensory memory to visual short-term memory. A natural question is whether these processes operate independently or interact. Recent evidence suggests that studies that reported interactions between masking and attention suffered from ceiling and/or floor effects. The objective of the present study was to investigate whether metacontrast masking and attention interact by using an experimental design in which saturation effects are avoided. We asked observers to report the orientation of a target bar randomly selected from a display containing either two or six bars. The mask was a ring that surrounded the target bar. Attentional load was controlled by set-size and masking strength by the stimulus onset asynchrony between the target bar and the mask ring. We investigated interactions between masking and attention by analyzing two different aspects of performance: (i) the mean absolute response errors and (ii) the distribution of signed response errors. Our results show that attention affects observers' performance without interacting with masking. Statistical modeling of response errors suggests that attention and metacontrast masking exert their effects by independently modulating the probability of "guessing" behavior. Implications of our findings for models of attention are discussed.
Topics: Attention; Humans; Memory, Short-Term; Perceptual Masking; Photic Stimulation; Task Performance and Analysis; Visual Perception
PubMed: 27032801
DOI: 10.3758/s13414-016-1090-y -
Journal of Vision 2015Phonological deficits in dyslexia are well documented. However, there is an ongoing discussion about whether visual deficits limit the reading skills of people with...
Phonological deficits in dyslexia are well documented. However, there is an ongoing discussion about whether visual deficits limit the reading skills of people with dyslexia. Here, we investigated visual crowding and backward masking. We presented a Vernier (i.e., two vertical bars slightly offset to the left or right) and asked observers to indicate the offset direction. Vernier stimuli are visually similar to letters and are strongly affected by crowding, even in the fovea. To increase task difficulty, Verniers are often followed by a mask (i.e., backward masking). We measured Vernier offset discrimination thresholds for the basic Vernier task, under crowding, and under backward masking, in students with dyslexia (n = 19) and age and intelligence matched students (n = 27). We found no group differences in any of these conditions. Controls with fast visual processing (good backward masking performance), were faster readers. By contrast, no such correlation was found among the students with dyslexia, suggesting that backward masking does not limit their reading efficiency. These findings indicate that neither elevated crowding nor elevated backward masking pose a bottleneck to reading skills of people with dyslexia.
Topics: Crowding; Dyslexia; Female; Fovea Centralis; Humans; Male; Perceptual Masking; Reading; Young Adult
PubMed: 26505966
DOI: 10.1167/15.14.13 -
Vision Research Dec 2011Current models of short-term visual perceptual memory invoke mechanisms that are closely allied to low-level perceptual discrimination mechanisms. The purpose of this...
Current models of short-term visual perceptual memory invoke mechanisms that are closely allied to low-level perceptual discrimination mechanisms. The purpose of this study was to investigate the extent to which human visual perceptual memory for spatial frequency is based upon multiple, spatially tuned channels similar to those found in the earliest stages of visual processing. To this end we measured how performance on a delayed spatial frequency discrimination paradigm was affected by the introduction of interfering or 'memory masking' stimuli of variable spatial frequency during the delay period. Masking stimuli were shown to induce shifts in the points of subjective equality (PSE) when their spatial frequencies were within a bandwidth of 1.2 octaves of the reference spatial frequency. When mask spatial frequencies differed by more than this value, there was no change in the PSE from baseline levels. This selective pattern of masking was observed for different spatial frequencies and demonstrates the existence of multiple, spatially tuned mechanisms in visual perceptual memory. Memory masking effects were also found to occur for horizontal separations of up to 6 deg between the masking and test stimuli and lacked any orientation selectivity. These findings add further support to the view that low-level sensory processing mechanisms form the basis for the retention of spatial frequency information in perceptual memory. However, the broad range of transfer of memory masking effects across spatial location and other dimensions indicates more long range, long duration interactions between spatial frequency channels that are likely to rely contributions from neural processes located in higher visual areas.
Topics: Discrimination, Psychological; Humans; Memory; Memory, Short-Term; Perceptual Masking; Photic Stimulation; Sensory Thresholds; Space Perception
PubMed: 21930142
DOI: 10.1016/j.visres.2011.09.003 -
Journal of Experimental Psychology.... Jun 2017Object-substitution masking (OSM) refers to when the delayed disappearance of a sparse mask that spatially surrounds but does not overlap the target impairs target... (Review)
Review
Object-substitution masking (OSM) refers to when the delayed disappearance of a sparse mask that spatially surrounds but does not overlap the target impairs target perception. Two major theoretical accounts have been offered to explain OSM: the object-substitution account, which stipulates that masking occurs when a separate mask representation replaces the target, and the object-updating account, which espouses that masking is the product of a single representation initially containing information about the target that is modified to reflect the mask. Here I critically review the evidence that has accumulated over two decades for the two models, and find the evidence overwhelmingly in favor of the object-updating account. This object-updating account places OSM in the larger framework of related phenomena such as a repetition blindness, apparent motion, and object correspondence through occlusion that gauge how the visual system assigns episodic object representations in the face of dynamic and ambiguous input. Implications for visual cognition more broadly are discussed. (PsycINFO Database Record
Topics: Humans; Models, Psychological; Perceptual Masking; Visual Perception
PubMed: 28263634
DOI: 10.1037/xhp0000395