Collective plasticity of binocular interactions in the adult visual system

Wang, Mengxin; McGraw, Paul V.; Ledgeway, Timothy

Abstract

Binocular visual plasticity can be initiated via either bottom-up or top-down mechanisms, but it is unknown if these two forms of adult plasticity can be independently combined. In seven participants with normal binocular vision, sensory eye dominance was assessed using a binocular rivalry task, before and after a period of monocular deprivation and with and without selective attention directed towards one eye. On each trial, participants reported the dominant monocular target and the inter-ocular contrast difference between the stimuli was systematically altered to obtain estimates of ocular dominance. We found that both monocular light- and pattern-deprivation shifted dominance in favour of the deprived eye. However, this shift was completely counteracted if the non-deprived eye’s stimulus was selectively attended. These results reveal that shifts in ocular dominance, driven by bottom-up and top-down selection, appear to act independently to regulate the relative contrast gain between the two eyes.

Citation

Wang, M., McGraw, P. V., & Ledgeway, T. (2024). Collective plasticity of binocular interactions in the adult visual system. Scientific Reports, 14(1), Article 10494. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-57276-8

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 15, 2024
• Online Publication Date: May 7, 2024
• Publication Date: May 7, 2024
• Deposit Date: Jun 3, 2024
• Publicly Available Date: Jun 4, 2024
• Journal: Scientific Reports
• Electronic ISSN: 2045-2322
• Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 14
• Issue: 1
• Article Number: 10494
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-57276-8
• Keywords: Attention; Perception; Psychology; Visual system
• Public URL: https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/34850087
• Publisher URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-024-57276-8
• Additional Information: Received: 3 September 2023; Accepted: 15 March 2024; First Online: 7 May 2024; : The authors declare no competing interests.