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The functional role of temporal structure in human perception: behavioral evidence and neural correlates

HU Rui-Chen^1,2, YUAN Pei-Jun^1,2, JIANG Yi^1,2, WANG Ying^1,2,*

¹State Key Laboratory of Brain and Cognitive Science, CAS Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology, Institute of Psychology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China；²Department of Psychology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China

Abstract

To extract the temporal structure of sensory inputs is of great significance to our adaptive functioning in the dynamic environment. Here we characterize three types of temporal structure information, and review behavioral and neural evidence bearing on the encoding and utilization of such information in visual and auditory perception. The evidence together supports a functional view that the brain not only tracks but also makes use of temporal structure from diverse sources for a broad range of cognitive processes, such as perception, attention, and unconscious information processing. These functions are implemented by brain mechanisms including neural entrainment, predictive coding, as well as more specific mechanisms that vary with the type of temporal regularity and sensory modality. This framework enriches our understanding of how the human brain promotes dynamic information processing by exploiting regularities in ubiquitous temporal structures.

Key words: temporal structure; perception; attention; awareness; neural oscillations; predictive coding

Received: 2018-06-01　　Accepted: 2018-09-25

Corresponding author: 王莹　　E-mail: wangying@psych.ac.cn

DOI: 10.13294/j.aps.2018.0092

Citing This Article：

HU Rui-Chen, YUAN Pei-Jun, JIANG Yi, WANG Ying. The functional role of temporal structure in human perception: behavioral evidence and neural correlates. Acta Physiol Sin 2019; 71 (1): 105-116 (in Chinese with English abstract).