Serial dependence in perception: basic and applied – SEDEP

Our subjective experience of the visual world is stable, continuous and seamless. How this phenomenology arises is one of the mysteries of cognitive science, because the outside world presents itself to our senses in a discontinuous manner. One mechanism that may lead from variable input to stable experience is serial dependence (SD), a phenomenon in which perceptual reports are biased in the direction of stimuli seen in the recent past. The current project will (1) systematically examine whether serial dependence is the manifestation of a perceptual effect, or if response biases are also involved; (2) study the relationships between SD and other history effects such as adaptation, bistability and idiosyncratic biases; (3) determine the level of processing at which SD occurs by looking at the role of cognitive load and by examine neural correlates; and (4) examine whether SD influences behavior in natural settings and how it can be harnessed in order to improve perceptual accuracy. These goals will be achieved by combining psychophysical and electroencephalographic techniques (MVPA and ERPs) in healthy human participants, including two professional categories (air traffic controllers and airport security technicians). The group of researchers is led by Prof. T. Collins and includes two CNRS Research Directors (M. Wexler and F. Waszak) a Research Engineer (Q. Yang) and technician (H. Habacha), all members of the Vision Group within the Integrative Neuroscience and Cognition Center (Univ. of Paris & CNRS, UMR 8002).