Suppression of pattern detection in apparent motion trajectory(Summaries of Awarded Presentation at the 28th Annual Meeting)

Letter discrimination is impaired when the letter is presented within an apparent motion (AM) trajectory of a spot. This finding suggests that the internal representation of AM stimuli can interfere with perception at a relatively high processing level. Here, we investigated whether AM interference also occurs at an earlier processing level. We found that the detection threshold of patterns defined by a luminance dimension was impaired in an AM trajectory. Further, this suppressive effect of AM became weaker when the contrast polarity, orientation, or shape of the inducers of the AM and the target was inconsistent. These findings suggest that AM stimuli and their internal representation affect early visual processes involved in detecting a pattern and that the internal representation of an AM stimulus reflects the stimulus's attribute.