Nature Neuroscience 8, 1497 - 1499 (2005)
Published online: 16 October 2005; | doi:10.1038/nn1546
The essential role of stimulus temporal patterning in enabling perceptual learningShu-Guang Kuai1, 3, Jun-Yun Zhang1, 3, Stanley A Klein2, Dennis M Levi2
& Cong Yu11
Institute of Neuroscience, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai 200031, China. 2
School of Optometry and Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA. 3
These authors contributed equally to this work.
Correspondence should be addressed to Cong Yu yucong@ion.ac.cn Little is known about how temporal stimulus factors influence perceptual learning. Here we demonstrate an essential role of stimulus temporal patterning in enabling perceptual learning by showing that 'unlearnable' contrast and motion-direction discrimination (resulting from random interleaving of stimuli) can be readily learned when stimuli are practiced in a fixed temporal pattern. This temporal patterning does not facilitate learning by reducing stimulus uncertainty; further, learning enabled by temporal patterning can later generalize to randomly presented stimuli.
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