Interocular transfer of the motion after-effect in normal and stereoblind observers

Abstract

The extent of interocular transfer of the motion after-effect was measured in 4 stereoblind subjects and in 19 subjects having varying degrees of stereopsis. Stereoblind individuals failed completely to show any interocular transfer of this after-effect, while subjects with good stereopsis exhibited between 55 and 82 percent transfer (mean 73 percent). Furthermore, normal subjects who manifested a clear eye dominance tended to show greater transfer from the dominant to the nondominant eye than vice versa. Individuals who either had a history of a strabismus or possessed some other early impediment to clear binocular vision tended to show less transfer. Overall there was a significant positive correlation of 0.75 between the extent of interocular transfer and the subject's stereoacuity. It is argued that the extent of interocular transfer of this after-effect provides a measure of the proportion of the total number of visual cortical neurons that are binocular. Thus stereoblind humans, who show no transfer whatsoever may, like cats and monkeys deprived of concordant binocular visual input early in life, suffer from a lack of binocular neurons.