Abstract:
Our visual perceptual system receives information about the outside world solely in the form of light, that projects a two-dimensional image of the three-dimensional world on our two retinas. However, one three-dimensional scene can result in infinitely different two-dimensional images and one two-dimensional image can be the result of many different three-dimensional sources. In order to veridically and accurately represent the outer world, our perceptual system relies on memory-based predictions about the true source of sensory information. These predictions can either result from recent events, forming precise and specific expectations or from consistent experiences we make over a longer period of time, forming abstract concepts that give less precise and less specific expectations. To investigate the workings of our perceptual system, it is thus fertile to violate the predictions made by an observer to see which parts of the brain are involved in processing the predicted stimulus. However, since it is more difficult to violate predictions based on abstract concepts, scientific investigations of prediction errors mostly focused on violating predictions based on newly learned associations or patterns. The aim of my doctoral thesis is to fill this gap by investigating the influence of violations of expectations, that are based on the most consistent experiences we make throughout our lives. Inspecting these violations, I gained insight about how predictions modulate sensory processing, our conscious experience and, in specific cases, why we feel the way we feel, when confronted with such violations of expectations.
