Brain mechanisms in audio-visual motion perception

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25245069
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (A)
• Allocation Type: Single-year Grants
• Section: 一般
• Research Field: Experimental psychology
• Research Institution: Waseda University
• Principal Investigator: Sugita Yoichi 早稲田大学, 文学学術院, 教授 (40221311)
• Co-Investigator(Kenkyū-buntansha): TOHYAMA Kojiro 岩手医科大学, バイオイメージングセンター, 教授 (10129033) ; TSUKIURA Takashi 京都大学, 大学院人間-環境学研究科, 准教授 (30344112)
• Project Period (FY): 2013-10-21 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 視聴覚統合 / ｆMRI / 事象関連電位

Outline of Final Research Achievements

It was demonstrated that sounds can trigger illusory visual apparent motion to static visual stimuli (sound-induced visual motion: SIVM): A visual stimulus blinking at a fixed location is perceived to be moving laterally with the presence of an alternating left-right sound source. We investigated brain activity related to the perception of SIVM using a 7T fMRI. Specifically, we focused on the patterns of neural activities in SIVM and visually induced visual apparent motion (VIVM). We observed activation in the middle occipital area thought to be involved in visual motion processing (V5/hMT) for SIVM and VIVM, and the magnitude of the activation in this area was positively related to those in the superior temporal regions. Moreover, the activation of the superior temporal area was greater in SIVM compared to VIVM. These findings indicate that similar but partially different neural mechanisms could be involved in auditory-induced and visually-induced motion perception.

Free Research Field

知覚心理学