Optic flow density modulates corner-cutting in a virtual steering task for younger and older adults.

There is a critical need to understand how aging visual systems contribute to age-related increases in vehicle accidents. We investigated the potential contribution of age-related detriments in steering based on optic flow, a source of information known to play a role in navigation control. Seventeen younger adults (mean age: 21.

Virtual reality assessment of reaching accuracy in patients with recent cerebellar stroke.

Background: Dysmetria, the inability to accurately estimate distance in motor tasks, is a characteristic clinical feature of cerebellar injury. Even though subjective dysmetria can be quickly detected during the neurological examination with the finger-to-nose test, objective quantification of reaching accuracy for clinical assessment is still lacking. Emerging VR technology allows for the delivery of rich multisensory environmental stimuli with a high degree of control.

Limited restoration of contrast sensitivity with training after V1 damage in humans.

Stroke damage to the primary visual cortex (V1) causes severe visual deficits, which benefit from perceptual retraining. However, whereas training with high-contrast stimuli can locally restore orientation and motion direction discrimination abilities at trained locations, it only partially restores luminance contrast sensitivity (CS). Recent work revealed that high-contrast discrimination abilities may be preserved in the blind field of some patients early after stroke.

Binocular rivalry under naturalistic geometry: Evidence from worlds simulated in virtual reality.

Binocular rivalry is a fascinating, widely studied visual phenomenon in which perception alternates between two competing images. This experience, however, is generally restricted to laboratory settings where two irreconcilable images are presented separately to the two eyes, an implausible geometry where two objects occupy the same physical location. Such laboratory experiences are in stark contrast to everyday visual behavior, where rivalry is almost never encountered, casting doubt on whether rivalry is relevant to our understanding of everyday binocular vision.

Positive affect disrupts neurodegeneration effects on cognitive training plasticity in older adults.

Cognitive training for older adults varies in efficacy, but it is unclear why some older adults benefit more than others. Positive affective experience (PAE), referring to high positive valence and/or stable arousal states across everyday scenarios, and associated functional networks can protect plasticity mechanisms against Alzheimer's disease neurodegeneration, which may contribute to training outcome variability. The objective of this study is to investigate whether PAE explains variability in cognitive training outcomes by disrupting the adverse effect of neurodegeneration on plasticity.