The Role of Colour and Luminance in Spatial Location. How does the brain form our impression of the world? Black and white images appear normal to us. However, colour images without luminance variation have little depth, suggesting that the brain does not process colour in the same way as luminance. A series of fresh experiments examine how colour and luminance are utilised for seeing the depth and position of objects. The results will help us to understand how the first stages of visual process ....The Role of Colour and Luminance in Spatial Location. How does the brain form our impression of the world? Black and white images appear normal to us. However, colour images without luminance variation have little depth, suggesting that the brain does not process colour in the same way as luminance. A series of fresh experiments examine how colour and luminance are utilised for seeing the depth and position of objects. The results will help us to understand how the first stages of visual processing in the brain shape our sense of the world, and help develop theories of human vision, as well as animal and machine models of vision.Read moreRead less
Mechanisms underlying the perception of surface slant. How our brain encodes sensory information is of fundamental importance in neuroscience. Visual after-effects (how looking at various stimuli can affect the perception of subsequently presented stimuli) have provided valuable information about mechanisms of perceptual coding. We will use an adaptation paradigm to examine two-dimensional and three-dimensional after-effects, and their dependence on common mechanisms. Stimulus manipulations will ....Mechanisms underlying the perception of surface slant. How our brain encodes sensory information is of fundamental importance in neuroscience. Visual after-effects (how looking at various stimuli can affect the perception of subsequently presented stimuli) have provided valuable information about mechanisms of perceptual coding. We will use an adaptation paradigm to examine two-dimensional and three-dimensional after-effects, and their dependence on common mechanisms. Stimulus manipulations will allow us to probe the steps involved in recovering three-dimensional slant, and recording the full time-course of the after-effect will allow us to gauge the plasticity of these mechanisms. These effects will be modelled in terms of the response properties of cortical neurons.Read moreRead less
A computational and experimental investigation into the organisation of letters in reading. In alphabetical languages, people need to learn to organise individual letters into groups so that they can read efficiently. This project will develop a model of this process, which will allow great insight into this key aspect of reading in terms of what the most efficient way of doing this is and what may go wrong and cause reading problems.
A theory of attention and decision-making in multi-attribute and multi-object perceptual judgements. The human brain is an efficient biological computation device for rapidly translating perception into action. This project will develop and test a mathematical model of the processes of visual selective attention and perceptual decision-making. These processes are at the heart of the brain's ability to carry out this translation in a fast and accurate way.
Feature processing in categorisation: modelling the time course of perceptual decision making. How do we perceive stable unified objects with a brain comprised of specialised neurons located in different regions? This project will test a model of perceptual categorisation to link feature processing in categorisation with other perceptual tasks like visual search and explain the time course of information processing in both.
Decision Processes in Visual Working Memory. This project aims to investigate a new theory of rapid human decision making and memory processes in contexts of a continuous choice set. Many real-world, action-oriented decisions, such as those made while driving, walking, or cycling, require the decision maker to choose from a continuous set of alternatives and decisions are often based on memories of past events. This project will use human experimentation and computational modelling methods to i ....Decision Processes in Visual Working Memory. This project aims to investigate a new theory of rapid human decision making and memory processes in contexts of a continuous choice set. Many real-world, action-oriented decisions, such as those made while driving, walking, or cycling, require the decision maker to choose from a continuous set of alternatives and decisions are often based on memories of past events. This project will use human experimentation and computational modelling methods to increase our understanding of the processes involved in an important class of memory-based decision tasks. The expected outcomes will provide an improved understanding of cognitive computation, which may aid in the future development of associated technologies.Read moreRead less
The capacity limitations of visual attention. Processes of attention allow the brain to select relevant stimuli from the environment and protect its limited information-processing capacity from overload. This project will develop and test a neurally-plausible, computational model of attentional selection and capacity limitations. The model describes how performance in simple cognitive tasks is determined by selection competition, the information and item capacity of visual short-term memory, and ....The capacity limitations of visual attention. Processes of attention allow the brain to select relevant stimuli from the environment and protect its limited information-processing capacity from overload. This project will develop and test a neurally-plausible, computational model of attentional selection and capacity limitations. The model describes how performance in simple cognitive tasks is determined by selection competition, the information and item capacity of visual short-term memory, and decision noise. It provides an account of how the effects of these various kinds of capacity limitation vary with strategy or task set, and provides a metric for the information capacity of visual short-term memory based on the additivity of signal-to-noise ratios.Read moreRead less
Stochastic, Neurally-Plausible Models for Selective Attention and Decision Making. An understanding of the basic cognitive processes involved in attention and decision making is the goal of international research effort in a number of disciplines. The benefits expected from such understanding include improvements in the diagnosis and treatment of a variety of cognitive deficits and improved occupational safety and efficiency in settings involving interaction with complex systems, such air traffi ....Stochastic, Neurally-Plausible Models for Selective Attention and Decision Making. An understanding of the basic cognitive processes involved in attention and decision making is the goal of international research effort in a number of disciplines. The benefits expected from such understanding include improvements in the diagnosis and treatment of a variety of cognitive deficits and improved occupational safety and efficiency in settings involving interaction with complex systems, such air traffic control, airline cockpits, motor vehicles, and process management. By developing mathematical models of these processes and the neural mechanisms that underlie them, this project will contribute to this understanding. It will also provide international postdoctoral opportunties for Australian-trained Ph.D. graduates.Read moreRead less
An Integrated Theory of Attention and Decision Making. Biologically, the fundamental computational task carried out by the human brain is the translation of perception into action. To perform this translation, attentional processes select relevant stimuli from the environment and decision processes then identify the selected stimuli. This project develops an integrated theory of attention and decision making in simple visual tasks, which will help us understand how these tasks are carried out i ....An Integrated Theory of Attention and Decision Making. Biologically, the fundamental computational task carried out by the human brain is the translation of perception into action. To perform this translation, attentional processes select relevant stimuli from the environment and decision processes then identify the selected stimuli. This project develops an integrated theory of attention and decision making in simple visual tasks, which will help us understand how these tasks are carried out in the brain. Understanding how these tasks are performed biologically will aid in the design of autonomous information-gathering and decision-making agents whose actions simulate human behaviour. Read moreRead less
The Stochastic Dynamics of Visual Attention. This project develops and tests a class of mathematical models of how information is represented statistically in the human visual system and how that representation is modified by selective attention. These models synthesise current theories about how the visual system encodes information and how people make judgements on the basis of that information. The domain of application of the existing class of models will be extended to allow them to predi ....The Stochastic Dynamics of Visual Attention. This project develops and tests a class of mathematical models of how information is represented statistically in the human visual system and how that representation is modified by selective attention. These models synthesise current theories about how the visual system encodes information and how people make judgements on the basis of that information. The domain of application of the existing class of models will be extended to allow them to predict performance in more complex settings than has hitherto been the case. A program of experimental studies will test the models by measuring human performance in response to computer-generated stimuli.
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