testing Local Recurrency First Order Theory
This branch of the ARC-FoHo project uses a combination of psychophysics, analytical process development, and computational neuroimaging approaches (fMRI) in healthy adult humans to evaluate whether first-order local recurrency signals in early visual cortical areas are sufficient to explain the strength of our subjective experiences of visual stimuli.
Authors: Brian Maniscalco, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Brian Odegaard, Jorge Morales, Sivananda Rajananda, Rachel Denison, and Megan A. K. Peters
Journal: Psychological Review
Status: in press
Attention robustly dissociates objective performance and subjective visibility reports
Authors: Karen J. Tian*, Brian Maniscalco*, Michael L. Epstein, Angela Shen, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Taiga Kurosawa, Jennifer A. Motzer, Emil Olsson, Emily E. Russell, Meghan E. Walsh, Juneau Wang, Tugral Bek Awrang Zeb, Richard Brown, Victor A. F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W. Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Megan A. K. Peters†, & Rachel N. Denison† (*co-first, †co-senior)
An adversarial collaboration to test predictions of first-order and higher-order theories of consciousness TWCF 0567 Updated preregistration for Experiment 1 fMRI Spring 2025
Authors: Michael Epstein, Emil Olsson, Karen Tian, Brian Maniscalco, and Jennifer Motzer performed pilot studies that contributed to the development of this document and the procedures described here. Emil Olsson and Michael Epstein wrote the first draft. Karen Tian, Megan Peters, and Rachel Denison revised the document. Megan Peters and Rachel Denison provided supervision
Status: On OSF https://osf.io/4awfh/files/pv5h2
VSS 2026
Attention enhances figure-ground segmentation signals in visual cortex
Authors: Michael Epstein, Emil Olsson, Juneau Wang, Karen Tian, Brian Maniscalco, Jennifer Motzer, Diana Gamboa, Angela Shen, Minh Nguyen, Meera Sriram, Sydney Liu, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Maggie Zhang, Vanessa Wu, Richard Brown, Victor Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu He, Jan Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Megan Peters^, Rachel Denison^
Status: Poster accepted
Characterizing figure-ground response modulation in human visual cortex
Authors: Emil Olsson, Michael Epstein, Juneau Wang, Karen Tian, Brian Maniscalco, Jennifer Motzer, Angela Shen, Minh Nguyen, Meera Sriram, Sydney Liu, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Maggie Zhang, Yuzheng Wu, Diana Gamboa, Richard Brown, Victor A. F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W. Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Rachel Denison^, Megan A. K. Peters^
Status: Talk accepted Friday, May 15, 2026, 4:15, Talk Room 2
ASSC 2026
Characterizing early visual cortical responses to figure-ground stimuli as a tool for studying visual awareness
Authors: Emil Olsson*, Michael Epstein*, Juneau Wang, Karen Tian, Brian Maniscalco, Jennifer Motzer, Angela Shen, Minh Nguyen, Meera Sriram, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Sydney Liu, Yuzheng Wu, Maggie Zhang, Diana Gamboa, Richard Brown, Victor A. F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W. Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Rachel Denison^, Megan A. K. Peters^
Status: Talk accepted, schedule not announced
CCN 2026
Spatial Attention Enhances Figure-Ground Modulation in Human Early Visual Cortex
Authors: Emil Olsson, Michael Epstein, Juneau Wang, Karen Tian, Brian Maniscalco, Jennifer Motzer, Minh Nguyen, Meera Sriram, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Angela Shen, Sydney Liu, Yuzheng Wu, Maggie Zhang, Diana Gamboa, Richard Brown, Victor A.F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Rachel N. Denison^, Megan A K Peters^
Status: Submitted
VSS 2024
Attention robustly dissociates objective performance and subjective visibility reports
Authors: Karen J. Tian*, Brian Maniscalco*, Michael Epstein, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Angela Shen, Giancarlo Arzu, Taiga Kurosawa, Jennifer Motzer, Emil Olsson, Lizbeth Romero, Emily Russell, Meghan Walsh, Juneau Wang, Tugral Bek Awrang Zeb, Richard Brown, Victor A. F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W. Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Megan A. K. Peters†, Rachel N. Denison†, *co-first authors, †co-senior authors
ASSC 2024
Subjective inflation under inattention is robust across stimulus types and performance levels, for both threshold and suprathreshold stimuli
Authors: Karen J. Tian*, Brian Maniscalco*, Michael Epstein, Olenka Graham Castaneda, Angela Shen, Giancarlo Arzu, Taiga Kurosawa, Jennifer Motzer, Emil Olsson, Lizbeth Romero, Emily Russell, Meghan Walsh, Juneau Wang, Tugral Bek Awrang Zeb, Richard Brown, Victor A. F. Lamme, Hakwan Lau, Biyu J. He, Jan W. Brascamp, Ned Block, David Chalmers, Megan A. K. Peters†, Rachel N. Denison†, *co-first authors, †co-senior authors
University of California Irvine
Boston University
Karen Tian (BU)
Brian Maniscalco (UCI)
Michael Epstein (BU)
Emil Olsson (UCI)
Angela Shen (UCI)
Olenka Graham Castaneda (UCI)
Jennifer Motzer (BU)
Juneau Wang (BU)
Emily Russell (BU)
Meghan Walsh (BU)
Tugral Bek Awrang Zeb (UCI)
Lizbeth Romero (UCI)
Giancarlo Arzu (UCI)
Meera Sriram (UCI)
Minh Nguyen (UCI)