Maria Wilenius-Emet

Publications (1)2.11 Total impact

• Article: An electrophysiological correlate of human visual awareness.

  Maria Wilenius-Emet, Antti Revonsuo, Ville Ojanen
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  ABSTRACT: In order to shed more light on the neural correlates of human visual awareness, event-related potentials (ERPs) were recorded in a perceptual threshold experiment. The masked stimuli (line-drawings of coherent, familiar objects and scrambled, meaningless non-objects) were presented below, near, and above the subjective perceptual threshold. A prominent negative ERP deflection, peaking around 260-270 ms from stimulus onset, was observed only for the stimuli reaching subjective visual awareness. The results indicate a direct relationship between the crossing of the subjective threshold and this negative ERP deflection. A similar ERP response called 'visual awareness negativity' (VAN) has been observed in recent studies, using completely different stimulus manipulations (change blindness, reduced contrast stimuli). Hence, VAN appears to be a general electrophysiological correlate of visual awareness, observed in any experimental design that contrasts consciously perceived vs. unperceived visual stimuli.
  Neuroscience Letters 02/2004; 354(1):38-41. · 2.11 Impact Factor