Invisible Flashes Alter Perceived Sound Location.

Information integration across the senses is fundamental for effective interactions with our environment. The extent to which signals from different senses can interact in the absence of awareness is controversial. Combining the spatial ventriloquist illusion and dynamic continuous flash suppression (dCFS), we investigated in a series of two experiments whether visual signals that observers do not consciously perceive can influence spatial perception of sounds.

A spatially collocated sound thrusts a flash into awareness.

To interact effectively with the environment the brain integrates signals from multiple senses. It is currently unclear to what extent spatial information can be integrated across different senses in the absence of awareness. Combining dynamic continuous flash suppression (CFS) and spatial audiovisual stimulation, the current study investigated whether a sound facilitates a concurrent visual flash to elude flash suppression and enter perceptual awareness depending on audiovisual spatial congruency.

Naturalistic stimulus structure determines the integration of audiovisual looming signals in binocular rivalry.

Rapid integration of biologically relevant information is crucial for the survival of an organism. Most prominently, humans should be biased to attend and respond to looming stimuli that signal approaching danger (e.g.

Interactions between apparent motion rivalry in vision and touch.

In multistable perception, the brain alternates between several perceptual explanations of ambiguous sensory signals. It is unknown whether multistable processes can interact across the senses. In the study reported here, we presented subjects with unisensory (visual or tactile), spatially congruent visuotactile, and spatially incongruent visuotactile apparent motion quartets.

Audiovisual interactions in binocular rivalry.

When the two eyes are presented with dissimilar images, human observers report alternating percepts-a phenomenon coined binocular rivalry. These perceptual fluctuations reflect competition between the two visual inputs both at monocular and binocular processing stages. Here we investigated the influence of auditory stimulation on the temporal dynamics of binocular rivalry.

3D shape perception from combined depth cues in human visual cortex.

Our perception of the world's three-dimensional (3D) structure is critical for object recognition, navigation and planning actions. To accomplish this, the brain combines different types of visual information about depth structure, but at present, the neural architecture mediating this combination remains largely unknown. Here, we report neuroimaging correlates of human 3D shape perception from the combination of two depth cues.