Competition between salience and informational value for saccade adaptation

Abstract

What we see is influenced by where we look. When confronted with multiple relevant targets, inaccurate saccade target selection can impair perceptual performance. Here we ask whether endpoint selection can be optimized by the mechanism maintaining saccade accuracy: saccade adaptation. Therefore, we introduce a double-target adaptation task, where a presaccadic peripheral stimulus (plaid) splits vertically into its two components (Gabor patches) during horizontal saccades. While both targets were task-relevant, one of them provided more information for the perceptual task, because it could only be identified after the saccade with near-foveal vision. The other target was highly salient and could also be identified in the presaccadic plaid using peripheral vision. This double-target paradigm induced saccade adaptation: Without a perceptual task, participants adapted to the salient target. When both targets were judged sequentially, participants mostly adapted to the target they had to judge first. When targets were judged simultaneously, endpoints were biased toward the informative target but showed no gradual learning and fell short of optimality. We observed gradual adaptation when targets shifted randomly such that a strategic adjustment of endpoints was not possible. Overall, these findings show that when multiple targets compete, our oculomotor system can learn to adjust endpoints in order to maximize information for perception. Yet individual variability and other factors affecting target priority play a crucial role.

Motor learning by selection in visual working memory

“…The previous remarks on the neural basis of delayed motor learning, as observed in our paradigm, assume that saccade adaptation to task-relevant stimuli is based on the same core mechanism as saccade adaptation elicited by intra-saccadic target steps 4 . So far, there are only a few behavioral studies on saccade adaptation to task-relevant stimuli 23 , 24 , 63 (for a review, see 6 ). Although some recent studies pointed out that, besides the cerebellum, higher cortical areas might contribute to saccade adaptation in general 64 , 65 , there is no physiological data specifically on task-driven saccade adaptation.…”

Top-down control of saccades requires inhibition of suddenly appearing stimuli

“…2c ). This indicates that without a behavioral goal, it is the default to select salience (Schütz et al, 2012 ; Wolf, Wagner, & Schütz, 2019 ), and this default bias does not decay over time but needs to be actively suppressed (Gaspar & McDonald, 2014 ; Gaspelin, Leonard, & Luck, 2015 ) when salience and behavioral goals compete. In contrast to that, Donk and van Zoest ( 2008 ) found that correct saccade selection decreased with increasing latency when participants had to select the most salient target.…”

Perceptual Difficulty Persistently Increases Dominance in Binocular Rivalry—Even Without a Task

“…While the latencies of saccadic eye movements are facilitated by the introduction of a perceptual task (Bieg et al., 2012; Montagnini & Chelazzi, 2005; Trottier & Pratt, 2005), they are not modulated by uncertainty in the stimulus (Wolf & Schütz, 2017). The sensorimotor adaptation of saccades is sensitive to a perceptual task (Schütz et al., 2014) and to some extent also to perceptual uncertainty (Gerardin et al., 2015; Wolf et al., 2019). In visual search, eye movements minimize uncertainty and maximize information gain under some conditions (e.g., Najemnik & Geisler, 2005; Peterson & Eckstein, 2012) but not under others (e.g., Nowakowska et al., 2017; Verghese, 2012).…”