Symposium on Associative Learning in Perception
(Pavlov & Perception)

August 23, 2006

ECVP 2006, St. Petersburg, Russia, August 20-25, 2006

Original announcement

Optional readings

Major goals:

• Clarify the relationship between various forms of perceptual learning--cue re-weighting, cue recruitment, recalibration, and learning to discriminate
• Develop consensus about appropriate methods for the experimental study of learned changes in appearance
  • What criteria should be accepted as a demonstration of change in appearance?
  • What criteria demonstrate that performance in a task is mediated by appearance?
• Review probabilistic approaches to perception dating from the 1940's that were inspired by Pavlov's work and that have relevance once again in light of modern Bayesian approaches to perception

Below is the finalized schedule.  Abstracts are here.

Part 1 (90 minutes): Appearance and classical conditioning

Start
time
0:00 Cue recruitment and appearance: The new relevance of ideas from half a century ago  Abstract
             Benjamin T. Backus
0:35 Pavlovian learning today  Abstract
            Shepard Siegel and Lorraine G. Allan
0:75 Discussion: Appearance and classical conditioning

Part 2 (90 minutes): Nature of perceptual learning and methods to study it

0:00 Changes in stimulus appearance mediating abrupt improvements in perceptual tasks  Abstract
             Nava Rubin, Kelly Ludmer, and Yadin Dudai
0:30 Associative learning in cortical visual area MT of macaque monkeys  Abstract
             Anja Schlack and Thomas D. Albright
0:45 Associative Learning in Perception: The role of temporal correlation in establishing transform invariant representations of objects  Abstract
             Guy Wallis
0:60 Learning effects in figure-ground perception: The importance of indirect measures  Abstract
             Mary A. Peterson
0:80 Discussion: Varieties of perceptual learning and methods of study

Part 3 (90 minutes): Nature of perceptual learning and methods to study it, cont.

0:00 Pavlov meets Posner: Associative learning and the deployment of attention  Abstract
            Árni Kristjánsson
0:15 Learning a new prior: Light from above  Abstract
            Wendy J. Adams
0:35 Failures of visual constancies due to erroneous cue recruitment?  Abstract
            Lawrence T. Maloney, Yun-Xian Ho, and Michael S. Landy
0:50 Bayesian model learning and the emergence of visual features and rules  Abstract
            József Fiser, Richard N. Aslin, Gergo Orbán, and Máté Lengyel
0:70 Discussion: What tools are available to study learned changes in appearance?
0:85 Final comments (Ben Backus)

Speaker guidelines

Contact: backus@psych.upenn.edu

Thanks to all of you (and especially Nava Rubin) for help with planning.

Updated: 17-Aug-2006