Contour integration in the peripheral field.

Abstract

Contour integration was measured in the normal peripheral field to determine if an explanation based solely on the known peripheral positional uncertainty was sufficient to explain performance. The task involved the detection of paths composed of micropatterns with correlated carrier orientations embedded in a field of similar micropatterns of random position and orientation (Field, D. J., Hayes A., & Hess, R. F. (1993). Vision Research, 33, 173-193). The intrinsic positional uncertainty for each eccentric locus was measured with the same stimulus and it did not account for levels of peripheral performance. We show that peripheral performance on this task does not get worse with eccentricity beyond about 10 degrees and that these results can be modeled by simple filtering without any subsequent cellular linking interactions.