Visual adaptation stronger at the horizontal than the vertical meridian: Linking performance with V1 cortical surface area.

Authors

Hsing-Hao Lee, Marisa Carrasco

Published in

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Volume 122. Issue 29. Pages e2507810122. Jul 22, 2025. Epub Jul 14, 2025.

Abstract

Visual adaptation reduces bioenergetic expenditure by decreasing sensitivity to repetitive and similar stimuli. In human adults, visual performance varies systematically around the polar angle for many visual dimensions and tasks: Performance is superior along the horizontal than the vertical meridian (horizontal-vertical anisotropy, HVA) and the lower than upper vertical meridian (vertical meridian asymmetry, VMA). These asymmetries are resistant to spatial and temporal attention. However, it remains unknown whether visual adaptation differs around the polar angle. Here, we investigated how adaptation influences contrast sensitivity at the fovea and perifovea across the four cardinal meridian locations for both horizontal and vertical stimuli in an orientation discrimination task. In the nonadapted conditions, the HVA was more pronounced for horizontal than vertical stimuli. For both orientations, adaptation was stronger along the horizontal than the vertical meridian, exceeding foveal adaptation. Additionally, perifoveal adaptation effects positively correlated with individual V1 cortical surface area. These findings reveal that visual adaptation mitigates the HVA in contrast sensitivity, fostering perceptual uniformity around the visual field while conserving bioenergetic resources.

PMID:
40658843
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 15 Jul 2025.

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