Temporal Limits of Brightness Induction and Mechanisms of Brightness Perception

The luminance of a squarewave grating was modulated in a manner such that every other stripe temporally varied between bright and dark and the intervening stripes had constant luminance. This produces brightness induction in the constant stripes, roughly in antiphase to the luminance modulation. We used this stimulus as a probe to explore the temporal properties of brightness induction and the mechanisms determining perceived brightness. Over a range of spatial frequencies we measured: (1) the highest temporal frequency at which brightness induction occurs; (2) the magnitude of induced brightness; and (3) the temporal phase of the induced brightness modulation. We find that brightness induction ceases with luminance modulation above a cutoff temporal frequency that depends on spatial frequency. The magnitude of induced brightness modulation is greatest at low spatial frequencies and low temporal frequencies. Induced brightness lags behind the luminance modulation and this phase lag increases as spatial frequency decreases. All of these findings can be understood as consequences of an induction process that takes longer to complete as the induction region increases in size.