ORCID Profile
0000-0003-0317-2599
Current Organisations
Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia
,
University of Sydney
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Publisher: IEEE
Date: 23-06-2021
Publisher: Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Date: 03-06-2016
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 11-2016
Publisher: MDPI AG
Date: 29-01-2022
Abstract: Number sense is the ability to estimate the number of items, and it is common to many species. Despite the numerous studies dedicated to unveiling how numerosity is processed in the human brain, to date, it is not clear whether the representation of numerosity is supported by a single general mechanism or by multiple mechanisms. Since it is known that deafness entails a selective impairment in the processing of temporal information, we assessed the approximate numerical abilities of deaf in iduals to disentangle these two hypotheses. We used a numerosity discrimination task (2AFC) and an estimation task, in both cases using sequential (temporal) or simultaneous (spatial) stimuli. The results showed a selective impairment of the deaf participants compared with the controls (hearing) in the temporal numerosity discrimination task, while no difference was found to discriminate spatial numerosity. Interestingly, the deaf and hearing participants did not differ in spatial or temporal numerosity estimation. Overall, our results suggest that the deficit in temporal processing induced by deafness also impacts perception in other domains such as numerosity, where sensory information is conveyed in a temporal format, which further suggests the existence of separate mechanisms subserving the processing of temporal and spatial numerosity.
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 09-2021
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 11-2020
Publisher: IEEE
Date: 11-2021
Publisher: IEEE
Date: 06-2019
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 05-10-2022
DOI: 10.3389/FPSYG.2022.1004504
Abstract: Moderate physical activity can influence cognitive functions and visual cortical activity. However, little is known about the effects of exercise on fundamental perceptual domains, such as spatial and temporal representation. Here we tackled this issue by testing the impact of physical activity on a temporal estimation task in a group of adult volunteers in three different conditions: (1) in a resting condition (baseline), (2) during moderate physical activity (cycling in place – PA), and (3) approximately 15 to 20 min following the physical activity phase, in which participants were seated and returned to a regular heart rate (POST). We show that physical activity specifically impacts time perception, inducing a consistent overestimation for durations in the range of milliseconds. Notably, the effect persisted in the POST session, ruling out the main contribution of either heart rate or cycling rhythmicity. In a control experiment, we found that spatial perception (distance estimation) was unaffected by physical activity, ruling out a major contribution of arousal and fatigue to the observed temporal distortion. We speculate that physical exercise might alter temporal estimation either by up-regulating the dopaminergic system or modulating GABAergic inhibition.
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 24-10-2017
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 2023
DOI: 10.1016/J.BRAINRES.2022.148148
Abstract: Temporal perception is so profoundly linked to hearing that congenitally and early deaf in iduals appear to experience visual temporal impairments. However, most studies investigated visual temporal perception in deaf in iduals using static stimuli, while ecological objects with which we interact in everyday life often move across space and time. Given that deafness does not impact spatial metric representations, we hypothesize that, while the temporal perception of static stimuli is altered after early hearing loss, it can be enhanced by providing additional, ecologically relevant information. To evaluate our hypothesis, deaf and hearing participants were tested using an oddball-like visual temporal task. In such a task, participants had to temporally discriminate a Target embedded in a series of static stimuli, whose spatiotemporal structure was dynamically manipulated during the presentation. Our results highlighted that deaf participants could not successfully discriminate the Target's duration when only temporal information was manipulated, while their temporal sensitivity significantly improved when coherent spatiotemporal information was displayed. Our findings suggest that deaf in iduals might develop compensatory strategies based on other visual, non-temporal features to estimate external time events.
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 03-06-2020
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 02-2022
DOI: 10.1016/J.BRAINRES.2021.147744
Abstract: When a brief flash is quickly presented aligned with a moving target, the flash typically appears to lag behind the moving stimulus. This effect is widely known in the literature as a flash-lag illusion (FLI). The flash-lag is an ex le of a motion-induced position shift. Since auditory deprivation leads to both enhanced visual skills and impaired temporal abilities, both crucial for the perception of the flash-lag effect, here we hypothesized that lack of audition could influence the FLI. 13 early deaf and 18 hearing in iduals were tested in a visual FLI paradigm to investigate this hypothesis. As expected, results demonstrated a reduction of the flash-lag effect following early deafness, both in the central and peripheral visual fields. Moreover, only for deaf in iduals, there is a positive correlation between the flash-lag effect in the peripheral and central visual field, suggesting that the mechanisms underlying the effect in the center of the visual field expand to the periphery following deafness. Overall, these findings reveal that lack of audition early in life profoundly impacts early visual processing underlying the flash-lag effect.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 07-01-2019
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 11-2021
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 12-09-2019
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 2018
DOI: 10.1016/J.COGNITION.2017.10.013
Abstract: The effects of early visual deprivation on auditory spatial processing are controversial. Results from recent psychophysical studies show that people who were born blind have a spatial impairment in localizing sound sources within specific auditory settings, while previous psychophysical studies revealed enhanced auditory spatial abilities in early blind compared to sighted in iduals. An explanation of why an auditory spatial deficit is sometimes observed within blind populations and its task-dependency remains to be clarified. We investigated auditory spatial perception in early blind adults and demonstrated that the deficit derives from blind in idual's reduced ability to remap sound locations using an external frame of reference. We found that performance in blind population was severely impaired when they were required to localize brief auditory stimuli with respect to external acoustic landmarks (external reference frame) or when they had to reproduce the spatial distance between two sounds. However, they performed similarly to sighted controls when had to localize sounds with respect to their own hand (body-centered reference frame), or to judge the distances of sounds from their finger. These results suggest that early visual deprivation and the lack of visual contextual cues during the critical period induce a preference for body-centered over external spatial auditory representations.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 02-10-2023
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 31-07-2019
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 10-2020
Publisher: Massachusetts Medical Society
Date: 11-08-2016
Publisher: Public Library of Science (PLoS)
Date: 08-05-2017
Publisher: IEEE
Date: 11-2018
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 10-2016
DOI: 10.1016/J.NEUBIOREV.2016.06.043
Abstract: Considering that cortical plasticity is maximal in the child, why are the majority of technological devices available for visually impaired users meant for adults and not for children? Moreover, despite high technological advancements in recent years, why is there still no full user acceptance of existing sensory substitution devices? The goal of this review is to create a link between neuroscientists and engineers by opening a discussion about the direction that the development of technological devices for visually impaired people is taking. Firstly, we review works on spatial and social skills in children with visual impairments, showing that lack of vision is associated with other sensory and motor delays. Secondly, we present some of the technological solutions developed to date for visually impaired people. Doing this, we highlight the core features of these systems and discuss their limits. We also discuss the possible reasons behind the low adaptability in children.
Publisher: American Psychological Association (APA)
Date: 12-2022
DOI: 10.1037/XGE0001252
Abstract: Sensory adaptation is a feature-specific modulation of neural responses and is potentially fundamental to maximizing perceptual sensitivity. Despite its function being unclear, it has been hypothesized that sensory adaptation modifies the neurons' response codes, increasing the ability to process sensory signals on a larger scale. To better understand how such flexibility of our brain is possible, we investigated the effect of high- and low-frequency vibrotactile adaptation on perceived tactile temporal frequency during childhood, a time known for the brain to experience varying levels of plasticity. We tested tactile temporal frequency discrimination thresholds in both children and adults before and after tactile adaptation. Our results demonstrate that sensory adaptation does not consistently change perceived tactile temporal frequency in younger children as it does in adults, as adult-like trends begin to emerge at around 8 years of age but consolidate only in 10-year-old children. The absence of adaptation aftereffects suggests that, under certain conditions, sensory history does not affect perception in younger children in a similar way to adults. Surprisingly, younger children proved to be less flexible in modulating neural responses after prolonged exposure to an adapting stimulus, a tendency conflicting with the high plasticity levels the brain experiences during the early stages of life. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date: 10-2021
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 17-03-2017
DOI: 10.1038/SREP44617
Abstract: Several studies on visually guided reach-to-grasp movements have documented that how objects are grasped differs depending on the actions one intends to perform subsequently. However, no previous study has examined whether this differential grasping may also occur without visual input. In this study, we used motion capture technology to investigate the influence of visual feedback and prior visual experience on the modulation of kinematics by intention in sighted (in both full-vision and no-vision conditions), early-blind and late-blind participants. Results provide evidence of modulation of kinematics by intention to a similar degree under both full-vision and no-vision conditions. Moreover, they demonstrate that prior visual experience has little impact on the tailoring of grasping movements to intention. This suggests that sequential action planning does not depend on visual input, and may instead be ascribed to the function of multisensory-motor cortical network that operates and develops not only in light, but also in darkness.
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Date: 24-10-2018
DOI: 10.1038/S41598-018-34074-7
Abstract: This study investigated the influence of body motion on an echolocation task. We asked a group of blindfolded novice sighted participants to walk along a corridor, made with plastic sound-reflecting panels. By self-generating mouth clicks, the participants attempted to understand some spatial properties of the corridor, i.e. a left turn, a right turn or a dead end. They were asked to explore the corridor and stop whenever they were confident about the corridor shape. Their body motion was captured by a camera system and coded. Most participants were able to accomplish the task with the percentage of correct guesses above the chance level. We found a mutual interaction between some kinematic variables that can lead to optimal echolocation skills. These variables are head motion, accounting for spatial exploration, the motion stop-point of the person and the amount of correct guesses about the spatial structure. The results confirmed that sighted people are able to use self-generated echoes to navigate in a complex environment. The inter-in idual variability and the quality of echolocation tasks seems to depend on how and how much the space is explored.
Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
Date: 02-06-2015
Start Date: 2023
End Date: 2026
Funder: HORIZON EUROPE Marie Sklodowska-Curie Actions
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