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Peer-reviewedCC BYJournal of vision

Is there a neural common factor for visual illusions?

  • Maya A Jastrzebowska1,2,3,4,5
  • Ayberk Ozkirli1,2,6,7,8
  • Aline F Cretenoud1,9,10
  • Bogdan Draganski11,12,2,13,14
  • Michael H Herzog1,15,16
16 affiliations
  1. 1Laboratory of Psychophysics, Brain Mind Institute, School of Life Sciences, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Lausanne, Switzerland.
  2. 2Laboratory for Research in Neuroimaging (LREN), Centre for Research in Neurosciences, Department of Clinical Neurosciences, Lausanne University Hospital and University of Lausanne, Lausanne, Switzerland.
  3. 3Department of Psychology, University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland.
  4. 4[email protected].
  5. 5https://orcid.org/0000-0002-2273-2881.
  6. 6Neuro-X Institute, School of Engineering, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Geneva, Switzerland.
  7. 7[email protected].
  8. 8https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0882-4683.
  9. 9[email protected].
  10. 10https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3040-5696.
  11. 11Imaging Neuroscience of Ageing - inAGE laboratory, Neurology Department-Inselspital, University Hospital Bern, University Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
  12. 12Institute for Diagnostic and Interventional Neuroradiology, Inselspital Bern, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
  13. 13[email protected].
  14. 14https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5159-5919.
  15. 15[email protected].
  16. 16https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5433-1030.
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Abstract

It has been reported that the surface area of the human primary visual cortex predicts the susceptibility to several spatial contextual illusions. Yet, contrary to common belief, illusions correlate only weakly at the perceptual level, raising the question of how they can correlate with a neural measure like V1 surface area. In addition, mounting evidence suggests that there is substantial interindividual variability not only in neural function and anatomy but also in the mapping between the two, which further challenges the findings of a neural common factor for illusions. In light of these concerns, our first goal was to re-evaluate the previous imaging results. Seeking to investigate whether these findings generalize, we expanded our study to other illusions. We could not replicate previous findings and did not find any other significant correlations, either at the perceptual level or between illusion susceptibility and visual functional neuroanatomy.

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Cite

BibTeXRIS
BibTeX
@article{jastrzebowska2026there,
  title = {{Is there a neural common factor for visual illusions?}},
  author = {Maya A Jastrzebowska and Ayberk Ozkirli and Aline F Cretenoud and Bogdan Draganski and Michael H Herzog},
  journal = {Journal of vision},
  year = {2026},
  month = oct,
  doi = {10.1167/jov.26.10.13},
  url = {https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42867317},
  note = {CC BY},
}
RIS
TY  - JOUR
TI  - Is there a neural common factor for visual illusions?
AU  - Maya A Jastrzebowska
AU  - Ayberk Ozkirli
AU  - Aline F Cretenoud
AU  - Bogdan Draganski
AU  - Michael H Herzog
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/10/01
JO  - Journal of vision
DO  - 10.1167/jov.26.10.13
UR  - https://europepmc.org/article/MED/42867317
AB  - It has been reported that the surface area of the human primary visual cortex predicts the susceptibility to several spatial contextual illusions. Yet, contrary to common belief, illusions correlate only weakly at the perceptual level, raising the question of how they can correlate with a neural measure like V1 surface area. In addition, mounting evidence suggests that there is substantial interindividual variability not only in neural function and anatomy but also in the mapping between the two, which further challenges the findings of a neural common factor for illusions. In light of these concerns, our first goal was to re-evaluate the previous imaging results. Seeking to investigate whether these findings generalize, we expanded our study to other illusions. We could not replicate previous findings and did not find any other significant correlations, either at the perceptual level or between illusion susceptibility and visual functional neuroanatomy.
SN  - 1534-7362
ER  -