Calendar of events
Department Brown Bag Lunch Seminars: Dr Alex Clarke, Psychology
Title: Contextual modulation of neural object recognition in the lab and real-world environments
Abstract:
How do we understand what we see? Recognising objects depends on dynamic transformations of neural states, from those reflecting visual inputs to semantic representations. Models of meaningful object recognition have tended to focus on the perception of specific objects without considering how the preexisting environment might shape those neural processes. But in the real world, we don’t see objects in isolation. When we see an object, we are already in a complex and rich environment, which leads to expectations about the kind of things we may see. Based on our recent studies, I will show that the expectations generated by the visual environment modulate the semantic processing of objects, as seen in neural activity both in the lab (using EEG and MEG) and in the real world – using mobile EEG and augmented reality. Across studies, we find that low-frequency theta and alpha activity is modulated by contextual congruency, with such effects localised to the ventral visual pathway. Pattern similarity analysis further suggests that oscillatory phase patterns within these frequencies relates to higher-level object properties, and that pattern similarity effects are further modulated by contextual congruency. These studies demonstrate that both in-lab and real-world contexts impact how we recognize objects, pointing towards a fundamental limitation of traditional models of object recognition.