test subjects (Cohen et al. 1997). Blindness causes the visual cortex to be recruited to a role in somatosensory processing, which contributes to the superior tactile perceptual talents of blind people.
Convergence of different sensory channels implies crossmodal interactions. In humans and most animals, a sudden touch to the body can enhance vision near that body part. Actually, cutaneous stimulation facilitates visual responses in the visual cortex (Cohen et al. 1997; Macaluso et al. 2000).
The notion that neural structures may have a “universal potential” is also in line with the fact that a perceptual principle may be implemented in different neural structures. “Lateral inhibition”—a principle by which contrast-borders are highlighted—discovered in the compound eye of the horseshoe crab, Limulus (Hartline 1949), is such a principle that works also in visual and tactile perception in vertebrates. The features-relating-algorithm—a principle of prey-selection—realized in the brains of toad (amphibian), mudskipper (fish), and mantis (insect) provides another example.
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS
The examples and comparisons across various sense modalities and species we have reviewed show that perceptual worlds are shaped up to the nature of the sensory systems which in turn are adapted and adaptable to behaviorally relevant stimuli. No matter what the sensory world looks like, the orientation and communication in that world requires basic strategies of stimulus perception involving recognition and localization. The employed tactics take advantage of individual experience as well as peculiarities that emerged during evolution of the species in dependence on the ecological benefits and constraints.
Animals—including humans—tend to abstract objects in terms of configurational features. The resulting sign-stimulus elicits an assigned behavior that depends on motivation and attention. Sign-stimuli are as simple as possible and resemble the originals as closely as necessary. They facilitate both perception and communication, thereby minimizing misinterpretations between “sender” and “receiver.” Neurobiological instruments underlying stimulus perception range from specialized receptor cells in sense organs to feature-analyzing assemblies of cells and feature-detecting cells in the CNS. Certain assemblies may function in a manner of a sensorimotor-coded releasing system, that depending on motivation and attention, selects the appropriate behavior.
For most sensory modalities there are sensory brain maps containing populations of neurons selectively tuned to different stimulus features, feature combinations or configurations. Neurosensory networks may be omnipotent in that they display various degrees of plasticity involving remodeling, sensory substitution, crossmodal interaction, and learning.
FURTHER READING
Textbooks
The Study of Instinct by Tinbergen (1951) is a classic textbook of ethology—especially impressive in view of Tinbergen’s foresight, e.g., in terms of the neuroethological fundamentals of behavior.
Hogan (2017) provides new insights in the study of animal behavior including behavioral ecology, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, and evolutionary developmental biology.
Prete (2004) presents a multi-author textbook describing in depth what the perceptual worlds of animals of various species might be.
Readers interested in the research of olfactory perception in insects will enjoy the ambitious review by Kaissling (2014).
Carew (2004) and Zupanc (2019) provide the best up-to-date treatments of neuroethology.
Movies
Ewert, J.-P. & IWF (Institut für den Wissenschaftlichen Film, Göttingen). Voice-Over: English.
If you scan this QR code with the QR app of your smartphone, or click the URL, you’re directed to an internet TIB|AV-Portal, which allows you to watch three English versions of movies about the visually guided prey-catching and threat-avoidance behaviors in toads and the underlying neurophysiological processes.
A1: Image Processing in the Visual System of the Common Toad: Behavior, Brain Function, Artificial Neuronal Net (No.: C1805). https://av.tib.eu/media/15148
This weblink refers to the movie dealing with: Image processing in the toad’s visual system from behavior to brain function, which is explained by a global model (“window hypothesis”) and simulated by an artificial neuronal net that—in an experimental platform of neuroengineering—advises a robot to select and pick out different objects moving on a conveyor belt.
A2: Gestalt Perception in the Common Toad-1: Innate Prey Recognition (No.: C1430). https://av.tib.eu/media/15241
This weblink refers to the movie dealing with: Species-specific prey-selection in the common toad with reference to the “worm” vs. “anti-worm” discrimination and its invariance under changes of other stimulus parameters, such as object motion, movement pattern, shift of retinal image (induced movement), direction of movement, background contrast, and background texture.
A3: Gestalt Perception in the Common Toad-2: Modification of Prey Recognition by Learning (No.: C1431). https://av.tib.eu/media/15242
The weblink refers to the movie dealing with: Modification of species-specific prey selection in common toads by learning, such as visual/olfactory associative learning, visual/visual (hand-feeding) associative learning and non-associative learning (stimulus-specific habituation).
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