1,720,974 research outputs found

    Action and perception are temporally coupled by a common mechanism that leads to a timing misperception

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    We move our eyes to explore the world, but visual areas determining where to look next (action) are different from those determining what we are seeing (perception). Whether, or how, action and perception are temporally coordinated is not known. The preparation time course of an action (e.g., a saccade) has been widely studied with the gap/overlap paradigm with temporal asynchronies (TA) between peripheral target onset and fixation point offset (gap, synchronous, or overlap). However, whether the subjects perceive the gap or overlap, and when they perceive it, has not been studied. We adapted the gap/overlap paradigm to study the temporal coupling of action and perception. Human subjects made saccades to targets with different TAs with respect to fixation point offset and reported whether they perceived the stimuli as separated by a gap or overlapped in time. Both saccadic and perceptual report reaction times changed in the same way as a function of TA. The TA dependencies of the time change for action and perception were very similar, suggesting a common neural substrate. Unexpectedly, in the perceptual task, subjects misperceived lights overlapping by less than ∼100 ms as separated in time (overlap seen as gap). We present an attention-perception model with a map of prominence in the superior colliculus that modulates the stimulus signal's effectiveness in the action and perception pathways. This common source of modulation determines how competition between stimuli is resolved, causes the TA dependence of action and perception to be the same, and causes the misperception

    A field theory of saccade generation: Temporal-to-spatial transform in the superior colliculus

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    AbstractRecent models have placed the superior colliculus inside the local feedback loop that generates the pulse of innervation needed to make a saccade. Such closed-loop models need to take into account the different coordinate systems of visual and motor signals. This paper presents a computational model showing how the superior colliculus can bring the visual and motor information together in a common reference frame

    Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis

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    The present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed

    Variations on the Author

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    “Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship

    Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis

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    We provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis

    The role of dentate nuclei in human oculomotor control: Insights from cerebrotendinous xanthomatosis

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    Key points: A cerebellar dentate nuclei (DN) contribution to volitional oculomotor control has recently been hypothesized but not fully understood. Cerebrotendinous xanthomatosis (CTX) is a rare neurometabolic disease typically characterized by DN damage. In this study, we compared the ocular movement characteristics of two sets of CTX patients, with and without brain MRI evidence of DN involvement, with a set of healthy subjects. Our results suggest that DN participate in voluntary behaviour, such as the execution of antisaccades, and moreover are involved in controlling the precision of the ocular movement. The saccadic abnormalities related to DN involvement were independent of global and regional brain atrophy. Our study confirms the relevant role of DN in voluntary aspects of oculomotion and delineates specific saccadic abnormalities that could be used to detect the involvement of DN in other cerebellar disorders. It is well known that the medial cerebellum controls saccadic speed and accuracy. In contrast, the role of the lateral cerebellum (cerebellar hemispheres and dentate nuclei, DN) is less well understood. Cerebrotendinous xanthomatosis (CTX) is a lipid storage disorder due to mutations in CYP27A1, typically characterized by DN damage. CTX thus provides a unique opportunity to study DN in human oculomotor control. We analysed horizontal and vertical visually guided saccades and horizontal antisaccades of 19 CTX patients. Results were related to the presence/absence of DN involvement and compared with those of healthy subjects. To evaluate the contribution of other areas, abnormal saccadic parameters were compared with global and regional brain volumes. CTX patients executed normally accurate saccades with normal main sequence relationships, indicating that the brainstem and medial cerebellar structures were functionally spared. Patients with CTX executed more frequent multistep saccades and directional errors during the antisaccade task than controls. CTX patients with DN damage showed less precise saccades with longer latencies, and more frequent directional errors, usually not followed by corrections, than either controls or patients without DN involvement. These saccadic abnormalities related to DN involvement but were independent of global and regional brain atrophy. We hypothesize that two different cerebellar networks contribute to the metrics of a movement: the medial cerebellar structures determine accuracy, whereas the lateral cerebellar structures control precision. The lateral cerebellum (hemispheres and DN) also participates in modulating goal directed gaze behaviour, by prioritizing volitional over reflexive movements. Journal compilatio
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