Asymmetry of perceived motion smear during head and eye movements: Evidence for a dichotomous neural categorization of retinal image motion

Abstract

We measured perceived motion smear when retinal image motion was created either by a physically moving object or by movement of the eyes or head. Consistent with previous reports, the extent of perceived motion smear during an eye or head movement is less than that produced by physical object motion when the eyes are stationary. Moreover, perceived smear is substantially smaller when the motion of the retinal image is in the same direction as the eye or head movement compared to when image motion is in the opposite direction. These results imply that extra-retinal signals associated with eye and head movements contribute to a reduction of perceived motion smear, thereby fostering perceptual clarity. We hypothesize that the visual system uses a simple dichotomous strategy in applying these extra-retinal signals, based only on the direction of retinal image motion with respect to the ongoing eye or head movement.

Temporal contrast sensitivity during smooth pursuit eye movements

“…This in turn means that motion opposite to the pursuit direction is selectively attenuated, leaving other directions unaffected. A similar pattern has been shown for perceived motion smear during pursuit (Bedell & Lott, 1996;Geisler, 1999;Tong, Aydin, & Bedell, 2007;Tong, Patel, & Bedell, 2005). These studies obtained that pursuit attenuates the perceived motion smear only for motion in the opposite direction, leaving motion in orthogonal direction unaffected.…”

Improved visual sensitivity during smooth pursuit eye movements: Temporal and spatial characteristics

“…Another effect, which might be related to the temporal changes of luminance processing, is the selectively reduced extent of perceived motion smear during smooth pursuit for motion in the opposite direction (Bedell & Lott, 1996;Tong et al, 2005Tong et al, , 2007. As such, a suppression of motion smear also occurs during passive eye movements, and it has been concluded that the effect is at least partially caused by proprioceptive signals .…”

A theory of moving form perception: Synergy between masking, perceptual grouping, and motion computation in retinotopic and non-retinotopic representations

“…Because object and self-motion are ubiquitous in natural viewing conditions, understanding how the human visual system achieves a rela-tively clear perception for moving objects is a fundamental problem in visual perception. While pursuit eye movements can retinotopically stabilize a moving target and help reduce its perceived smear (Bedell & Lott, 1996; Tong, Patel, & Bedell, 2005), even under these conditions, the problem of smear remains for other ob-jects present in the scene. Furthermore, the initiation of an eye movement can take about 150–200 ms dur-ing which a moving object can generate considerable smear.…”