High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.

Perception is shaped by both incoming sensory input and expectations derived from our prior knowledge. Numerous studies have shown stronger neural activity for surprising inputs, suggestive of predictive processing. However, it is largely unclear what predictions are made across the cortical hierarc...

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Main Authors: David Richter, Tim C Kietzmann, Floris P de Lange
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Public Library of Science (PLoS) 2024-11-01
Series:PLoS Biology
Online Access:https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002829
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author David Richter
Tim C Kietzmann
Floris P de Lange
author_facet David Richter
Tim C Kietzmann
Floris P de Lange
author_sort David Richter
collection DOAJ
description Perception is shaped by both incoming sensory input and expectations derived from our prior knowledge. Numerous studies have shown stronger neural activity for surprising inputs, suggestive of predictive processing. However, it is largely unclear what predictions are made across the cortical hierarchy, and therefore what kind of surprise drives this up-regulation of activity. Here, we leveraged fMRI in human volunteers and deep neural network (DNN) models to arbitrate between 2 hypotheses: prediction errors may signal a local mismatch between input and expectation at each level of the cortical hierarchy, or prediction errors may be computed at higher levels and the resulting surprise signal is broadcast to earlier areas in the cortical hierarchy. Our results align with the latter hypothesis. Prediction errors in both low- and high-level visual cortex responded to high-level, but not low-level, visual surprise. This scaling with high-level surprise in early visual cortex strongly diverged from feedforward tuning. Combined, our results suggest that high-level predictions constrain sensory processing in earlier areas, thereby aiding perceptual inference.
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institution Kabale University
issn 1544-9173
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language English
publishDate 2024-11-01
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spelling doaj-art-097639ad40984ef7997e811c396c5a6a2024-11-20T05:30:36ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLoS Biology1544-91731545-78852024-11-012211e300282910.1371/journal.pbio.3002829High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.David RichterTim C KietzmannFloris P de LangePerception is shaped by both incoming sensory input and expectations derived from our prior knowledge. Numerous studies have shown stronger neural activity for surprising inputs, suggestive of predictive processing. However, it is largely unclear what predictions are made across the cortical hierarchy, and therefore what kind of surprise drives this up-regulation of activity. Here, we leveraged fMRI in human volunteers and deep neural network (DNN) models to arbitrate between 2 hypotheses: prediction errors may signal a local mismatch between input and expectation at each level of the cortical hierarchy, or prediction errors may be computed at higher levels and the resulting surprise signal is broadcast to earlier areas in the cortical hierarchy. Our results align with the latter hypothesis. Prediction errors in both low- and high-level visual cortex responded to high-level, but not low-level, visual surprise. This scaling with high-level surprise in early visual cortex strongly diverged from feedforward tuning. Combined, our results suggest that high-level predictions constrain sensory processing in earlier areas, thereby aiding perceptual inference.https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002829
spellingShingle David Richter
Tim C Kietzmann
Floris P de Lange
High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
PLoS Biology
title High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
title_full High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
title_fullStr High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
title_full_unstemmed High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
title_short High-level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex.
title_sort high level visual prediction errors in early visual cortex
url https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.3002829
work_keys_str_mv AT davidrichter highlevelvisualpredictionerrorsinearlyvisualcortex
AT timckietzmann highlevelvisualpredictionerrorsinearlyvisualcortex
AT florispdelange highlevelvisualpredictionerrorsinearlyvisualcortex