The role of human brain area hMT+ in the perception of global motion investigated with repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS).

Background: Psychophysical evidence suggests that the perception of the motion and color of moving stimuli are determined separately in the human brain. Here we aim to determine the role of visual cortical areas hMT+ and V1/V2 in each task by measuring the effect of rTMS of each area using an off-line continuous theta-burst stimulation (cTBS) protocol.

Methods: In the motion task, the direction of moving dots was identified using a global motion stimulus that avoids tracking, and in the detection task for the same stimulus, the presence of the dots was detected regardless of motion.

Perceived size change induced by nonvisual signals in darkness: the relative contribution of vergence and proprioception.

Most of the time, the human visual system computes perceived size by scaling the size of an object on the retina with its perceived distance. There are instances, however, in which size-distance scaling is not based on visual inputs but on extraretinal cues. In the Taylor illusion, the perceived afterimage that is projected on an observer's hand will change in size depending on how far the limb is positioned from the eyes-even in complete darkness.