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Late development of cue integration is linked to sensory fusion in cortex.


Type

Article

Change log

Authors

Dekker, Tessa M 
Ban, Hiroshi 
van der Velde, Bauke 
Sereno, Martin I 
Welchman, Andrew E 

Abstract

Adults optimize perceptual judgements by integrating different types of sensory information [1, 2]. This engages specialized neural circuits that fuse signals from the same [3-5] or different [6] modalities. Whereas young children can use sensory cues independently, adult-like precision gains from cue combination only emerge around ages 10 to 11 years [7-9]. Why does it take so long to make best use of sensory information? Existing data cannot distinguish whether this (1) reflects surprisingly late changes in sensory processing (sensory integration mechanisms in the brain are still developing) or (2) depends on post-perceptual changes (integration in sensory cortex is adult-like, but higher-level decision processes do not access the information) [10]. We tested visual depth cue integration in the developing brain to distinguish these possibilities. We presented children aged 6-12 years with displays depicting depth from binocular disparity and relative motion and made measurements using psychophysics, retinotopic mapping, and pattern classification fMRI. Older children (>10.5 years) showed clear evidence for sensory fusion in V3B, a visual area thought to integrate depth cues in the adult brain [3-5]. By contrast, in younger children (<10.5 years), there was no evidence for sensory fusion in any visual area. This significant age difference was paired with a shift in perceptual performance around ages 10 to 11 years and could not be explained by motion artifacts, visual attention, or signal quality differences. Thus, whereas many basic visual processes mature early in childhood [11, 12], the brain circuits that fuse cues take a very long time to develop.

Description

Keywords

Adult, Attention, Brain, Brain Mapping, Cerebral Cortex, Child, Cues, Depth Perception, Female, Humans, Image Processing, Computer-Assisted, Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Male, Neural Pathways, Perception, Photic Stimulation, Psychophysics, Vision Disparity, Visual Cortex

Journal Title

Curr Biol

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

0960-9822
1879-0445

Volume Title

25

Publisher

Elsevier BV
Sponsorship
Wellcome Trust (095183/Z/10/Z)
Supported by UK ESRC grant RES-061-25-0523, the Wellcome Trust (095183/ Z/10/Z), JSPS (KAKENHI 26870911), NIH grant R01-MH-081990, a Royal Society Wolfson Research Merit Award, the Swire Trust, and the NIHR Biomedical Research Centre at Moorfields Eye Hospital and the UCL Institute of Ophthalmology.