Unsupervised Natural Visual Experience Rapidly Reshapes Size-Invariant Object Representation in Inferior Temporal Cortex

TitleUnsupervised Natural Visual Experience Rapidly Reshapes Size-Invariant Object Representation in Inferior Temporal Cortex
Publication TypeJournal Article
Year of Publication2010
AuthorsLi, N, DiCarlo, JJ
JournalNeuron
Volume67
Issue6
Pagination1062 - 1075
Date Published01/2010
ISSN08966273
Abstract

We easily recognize objects and faces across a myriad of retinal images produced by each object. One hypothesis is that this tolerance (a.k.a. "invariance") is learned by relying on the fact that object identities are temporally stable. While we previously found neuronal evidence supporting this idea at the top of the nonhuman primate ventral visual stream (inferior temporal cortex, or {IT),} we here test if this is a general tolerance learning mechanism. First, we found that the same type of unsupervised experience that reshaped {IT} position tolerance also predictably reshaped {IT} size tolerance, and the magnitude of reshaping was quantitatively similar. Second, this tolerance reshaping can be induced under naturally occurring dynamic visual experience, even without eye movements. Third, unsupervised temporal contiguous experience can build new neuronal tolerance. These results suggest that the ventral visual stream uses a general unsupervised tolerance learning algorithm to build its invariant object representation.

URLhttps://linkinghub.elsevier.com/retrieve/pii/S0896627310006392
DOI10.1016/j.neuron.2010.08.029
Short TitleNeuron