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These projects relate to normal visual perception of objects, and the neural basis of their representation.
Face perception is typically regarded as an example of holistic processing, in which the individual features are deprecated in favor of an integrated representation of the whole face. Yet, there is neurophysiologic and behavioral evidence that suggests that face parts are represented at some stage of the visual processing of facial appearance. Using a manipulation of stereoscopic depth, we have demonstrated using fMRI that ventral temporal cortex contains representations of both face parts and wholes. Current studies are extending this manipulation to examine the influence of face parts and wholes on the MEG signature of face perception.
For complex stimuli, the best description of neural representation may be in terms of the relative similarity of one stimulus to another as expressed in a neural population code. Using a continuous carry-over approach, we are eximining the neural representation of faces and objects in terms of the perceptual similarity of the stimuli. The motivating hypothesis is that different stages of the visual processing hierarchy contain different representations of a stimulus space, dependent upon the perceptual axes that are locally represented.
In collaboration with Anjan Chatterjee, we have examined the neural correlates of varying facial attractiveness. It appears that the LOC and FFA represent the relative attractiveness of a face by the bulk amplitude of neural response.
Building upon our studies of face similarity and attractiveness, we have created a battery of face perception tasks that are suitable for use with neurologically impaired populations. These tasks may be freely downloaded and used.