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Abstract
A fundamental challenge for cognitive neuroscience is characterizing how the primitives of psychological theory are neurally implemented. Attempts to meet this challenge are a manifestation of what Fechner called "inner" psychophysics: The theory of the precise mapping between mental quantities and the brain. In his own time, inner psychophysics remained an unrealized ambition for Fechner. We suggest that, today, multivariate pattern analysis (MVPA), or neural "decoding," methods provide a promising starting point for developing an inner psychophysics. A cornerstone of these methods are simple linear classifiers applied to neural activity in high-dimensional activation spaces. We describe an approach to inner psychophysics based on the shared architecture of linear classifiers and observers under decision boundary models such as signal detection theory. Under this approach, distance from a decision boundary through activation space, as estimated by linear classifiers, can be used to predict reaction time in accordance with signal detection theory, and distance-to-bound models of reaction time. Our "neural distance-to-bound" approach is potentially quite general, and simple to implement. Furthermore, our recent work on visual object recognition suggests it is empirically viable. We believe the approach constitutes an important step along the path to an inner psychophysics that links mind, brain, and behavior.
Original language | English |
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Article number | 190 |
Pages (from-to) | 1-8 |
Number of pages | 8 |
Journal | Frontiers in Neuroscience |
Volume | 10 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 28 Apr 2016 |
Bibliographical note
Copyright the Author(s) 2016. Version archived for private and non-commercial use with the permission of the author/s and according to publisher conditions. For further rights please contact the publisher.Keywords
- Inner psychophysics
- MVPA
- Reaction times
- Signal detection theory
- Visual object categorization
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- 1 Finished
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Decoding the neural representation of objects in the human brain
Carlson, T., MQRES, M. & MQRES 3 (International), M. 3.
1/06/13 → 31/05/17
Project: Research