Neural activity in human visual cortex is transformed by learning real world size.

ABSTRACT: The way that our brain processes visual information is directly affected by our experience. Repeated exposure to a visual stimulus triggers experience-dependent plasticity in the visual cortex of many species. Humans also have the unique ability to acquire visual knowledge through instruction. We introduced human participants to the real-world size of previously unfamiliar species, and to the functional motion of novel tools, during a functional magnetic resonance imaging scan. Using machine learning, we compared activity patterns evoked by images of the new items, before and after participants learned the animals' real-world size or tools' motion. We found that, after acquiring size information, participants' visual activity patterns for the new animals became more confusable with activit

SUBMITTER: Coutanche MN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6345670 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature