Abstract
Our understanding of each moment of the visual world depends on the previous moment. We make use of temporal context to segregate objects, to accumulate visual evidence, to comprehend sequences of events, and to generate predictions. Temporal integration -- the process of combining past and present information -- appears not to be restricted to specialized subregions of the brain, but is widely distributed across the cerebral cortex. In addition, temporal integration processes appear to be systematically organized into a hierarchy, with gradually greater context dependence as one moves toward higher order regions. What is the mechanistic basis of this temporal hierarchy? What are its implications for perception and learning, especially in determining the boundaries between visual events? How does temporal integration relate to the processes supporting working memory and episodic memory? After reviewing the evidence around each of these questions, I will describe a computational model of hierarchical temporal processing in the human cerebral cortex. Finally, I will describe our tests of the predictions of this model for for brain and behavior, in settings where where humans perceive and learn nested temporal structure.
Meeting abstract presented at VSS 2018