强联觉的认知加工模型及其脑机制

联觉是当个体感受到一种感觉刺激的同时体验到其它感觉的现象, 主要分为强联觉和弱联觉两种。本文主要介绍了强联觉的各种类型及其相关脑机制的研究, 分析和比较了前人从结构和认知加工角度建构的多个强联觉理论模型, 总结了这些模型对强联觉现象脑神经机制的解释。同时本文还探讨了强联觉与其它(如注意、记忆、创造力等)认知加工过程的关系, 对弱联觉(即联觉隐喻)的研究进展和不足也进行了分析和总结, 指出未来对联觉的研究趋势应集中在弱联觉的研究上。     

数形联觉——数字空间表征研究“新”取向

数字空间表征是人类对数字进行表征的重要方式。数形联觉（number-form synesthesia）是一种数字可以有意识地引起空间知觉的独特现象,与此类似的是非联觉者中广泛存在的无意识的心理数字线（mental number line）现象。两者在行为和脑机制上存在着很多重叠,也存在着值得思考的差异。数形联觉的研究能够提供实质性的行为和脑机制数据,用以解决数字空间表征研究中出现的问题,加强对于数字空间表征的理解;也为更加全面深入地开展进一步研究提供了新的启示,成为数字空间表征研究中值得推崇的新取向。     

尤哈尼·帕拉斯玛感官建筑理论解读

视觉中心主义是建筑领域受到关注的议题之一。芬兰建筑师尤哈尼·帕拉斯玛呼吁重视感官体验，特别强调触觉的价值和自我感知的重要性，并将自身观点凝结为感官建筑理论。研究感官建筑的概念，梳理其从视觉批判到感官重塑，再到实现精神完善的逻辑线，以此推演出知觉与建筑、行为与场所、思维与空间之间的关系，并将其作为延伸建筑学边界的设计策略。     

基于AR技术的科普绘本多感官体验设计

AR科普绘本以视听交互构建沉浸体验,以触控交互构建互动体验,以媒介交互构建联觉体验,以此调动儿童视觉、听觉、触觉、味觉、嗅觉五感体验和动作、情感等行为体验。AR科普绘本的创作需要紧随媒介交互的时代,提升知识性、科学性、趣味性、启发性、智能性和艺术性,为儿童营造更真实和全面的多感官整合体验。AR科普绘本的多感官体验设计主要可以归纳为视听交互构建的沉浸体验、触控交互构建的互动体验和媒介交互构建的联觉体验。     

感官知觉限制及其超越之道──试论老庄及道教认识论的一项重要主题

本文旨在剖析老庄及道教对于感官知觉之限制的认识，其所采取超越感官知觉限制的种种方法，以及其独特的智性直观认识论主张。     

联觉的发展与习得

联觉具有基因遗传性, 基因遗传在决定联觉中起到重要作用, 但并不意味着基因遗传就是决定联觉的唯一因素, 联觉具有在后期发展的可能, 并且这种发展呈现倒U形曲线。既然联觉是发展的, 那么联觉可否通过训练习得呢？目前不少研究对非联觉者进行了配对关联训练, 发现训练后的非联觉者具有类似于联觉者的表现, 也发现训练后的非联觉者与真正的联觉者具有一定的差异。但目前研究还没有直接或强有力的证据表明训练所致的配对关联就是一种联觉, 训练后的非联觉者就能变成联觉者。相反地, 越来越多的证据显示非联觉者经过配对关联训练后可能无法成为真正的联觉者。     

对外部事物的知觉是否需要身体感官?

康德在《纯粹理性批判》的"驳斥唯心论"中,试图论证我们的内部经验依赖于对外部事物存在的知觉才能发生。卡萨姆指出,即便康德的论证成立,也不能必然证明身体的存在,除非对外部事物的知觉要以身体感官为条件。本文从该问题意识出发,但不局限于解决卡萨姆指出的问题,而是从我们指称确认系统、视角性视觉经验、对外部对象的个体化三个方面,论证身体感官在其中的重要作用,一般地论证对外部事物的知觉需要身体感官。     

特异功能存在吗?--从粒子物理学的发展看

特异功能一般包括超感官知觉(extrasensory perception,ESP)、心电感应、心灵致动、预知等。超感官知觉的典型是超视力,即对客观事物的超大型感应力;心电感应就是对别人思想的超感应力;预感力就是对未来事件的感应力;心灵致动就是通过心灵活动去影响物体或事态的发展。     

音乐知觉期待的研究述评

音乐知觉期待是音乐时间知觉过程中重要的心理现象,它直接影响音乐作为时间艺术的本质特性。文章主要探讨了和音乐知觉期待相关的以下几方面问题：音乐知觉期待存在的范畴,音乐知觉期待依靠音乐元素的四种期待率,音乐知觉期待存在的两种类别和采用的五种研究范式,音乐知觉期待研究的主要领域（神经生理机制、记忆和启动效应等方面）,以及音乐知觉期待通过音乐时间知觉和时间估计对音乐时间操作的影响。展望该领域今后研究的方向,可以认为,对音乐知觉期待的心理特征和存在条件在音乐时间操作中作用的进一步研究,将在很大程度上揭示音乐时间操作中的普遍现象——计时偏差的真正原因     

复合运动刺激视觉追踪的初步研究

本实验采用多目标追踪和复合刺激研究范式,将注意追踪和知觉的整体优先性两个研究领域中存在的知觉组织规律相结合,对单一和多个复合刺激进行注意追踪研究.结果表明:在单一或多个复合刺激追踪过程中,同样遵循静态知觉组织原则;不同知觉组织形式对知觉加工有不同的影响,突出的颜色变化可以促进知觉组织加工.     

Beyond visual imagery: How modality-specific is enhanced mental imagery in synesthesia?

Synesthesia based in visual modalities has been associated with reports of vivid visual imagery. We extend this finding to consider whether other forms of synesthesia are also associated with enhanced imagery, and whether this enhancement reflects the modality of synesthesia. We used self-report imagery measures across multiple sensory modalities, comparing synesthetes’ responses (with a variety of forms of synesthesia) to those of non-synesthete matched controls. Synesthetes reported higher levels of visual, auditory, gustatory, olfactory and tactile imagery and a greater level of imagery use. Furthermore, their reported enhanced imagery is restricted to the modalities involved in the individual’s synesthesia. There was also a relationship between the number of forms of synesthesia an individual has, and the reported vividness of their imagery, highlighting the need for future research to consider the impact of multiple forms of synesthesia. We also recommend the use of behavioral measures to validate these self-report findings.     

Synesthesia: Strong and Weak

In this review, we distinguish strong and weak forms of synesthesia. Strong synesthesia is characterized by a vivid image in one sensory modality in response to stimulation in another one. Weak synesthesia is characterized by cross-sensory correspondences expressed through language, perceptual similarity, and perceptual interactions during information processing. Despite important phenomenological dissimilarities between strong and weak synesthesia, we maintain that the two forms draw on similar underlying mechanisms. The study of strong and weak synesthetic phenomena provides an opportunity to enrich scientists' understanding of basic mechanisms involved in perceptual coding and cross-modal information processing.     

Modality and variability of synesthetic experience

In synesthesia, stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to additional, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. We here review previous surveys on this neurologically based phenomenon and report the results of 63 synesthetes who completed our Internet and paper questionnaire on synesthesia. In addition to asking for personal data and information on the participant's synesthesia, the questionnaire focused on the components of the inducer that elicit or modulate synesthesia. Synesthesia was most often developmental (92%) and of the grapheme-color type (86%). Sixty-two percent of the participants perceived time-related words in a spatial configuration. Music-color synesthesia was common (41%), and synesthesia for natural and artificial sounds (33%) was higher than in previous estimates. Eighty-one percent of participants experienced more than one form of synesthesia. Multimodal synesthesia, in which inducer and concurrent belong to 2 different sensory modalities, occurred in 92% of the participants. Overall, auditory stimuli were most often reported as inducers, and visual concurrents were most common. Modulations of the synesthetic experiences such as changes of the concurrent color, expansion within the same or to a different sensory modality, or reduction of the number of inducers over time were reported by 17% of participants. This challenges the presumed consistency of synesthesia and the adequacy of the test-retest consistency score still most commonly used to assess the veracity of reported synesthesia. Implications of the high prevalence of cross-modal synesthesia and the variability of synesthesia are discussed.     

Bright sneezes and dark coughs, loud sunlight and soft moonlight

Synesthetic metaphors (such as "the dawn comes up like thunder") are expressions in which words or phrases describing experiences proper to one sense modality transfer their meanings to another modality. In a series of four experiments, subjects used scales of loudness, pitch, and brightness to evaluate the meanings of a variety of synesthetic (auditory-visual) metaphors. Loudness and pitch expressed themselves metaphorically as greater brightness; in turn, brightness expressed itself as greater loudness and as higher pitch. Although loudness thus shared with brightness a metaphorical connection, pitch and brightness showed a connection that was closer and that applied more generally to different kinds of visual brightness. The ways that people evaluate synesthetic metaphors emulate the characteristics of synesthetic perception, thereby suggesting that synesthesia in perception and synesthesia in language both may emenate from the same source-from a phenomenological similarity in the makeup of sensory experiences of different modalities.     

Olfactory-induced synesthesias: a review and model

Recent reviews of synesthesia concentrate upon rare neurodevelopmental examples and exclude common olfactory-induced experiences with which they may profitably be compared. Like the neurodevelopmental synesthesias, odor-induced experiences involve different sensory modalities; are reliable, asymmetric (concurrents cannot induce), and automatic; and the inducer-concurrent relationship is learnt. Unlike neurodevelopmental synesthesias, these experiences are universal and their synesthetic nature goes unrecognized. Olfaction's ability to universally induce concurrents may result from its unique neuroanatomy, affording dual access to neocortex. We propose that concurrents arise here via a twofold process: by direct neocortical activation, which recovers a configural memory, and by attribution of this memory to the olfactory modality by thalamic attentional processes. The implications of this for other forms of synesthesia are then examined.     

Enhanced mental rotation ability in time-space synesthesia

Time-space synesthesia is a variant of sequence–space synesthesia and involves the involuntary association of months of the year with 2D and 3D spatial forms, such as arcs, circles, and ellipses. Previous studies have revealed conflicting results regarding the association between time-space synesthesia and enhanced spatial processing ability. Here, we tested 15 time-space synesthetes, and 15 non-synesthetic controls matched for age, education, and gender on standard tests of mental rotation ability, spatial working memory, and verbal working memory. Synesthetes performed better than controls on our test of mental rotation, but similarly to controls on tests of spatial and verbal working memory. Results support a dissociation between visuo-spatial imagery and spatial working memory capacity, and suggest time-space synesthesia is associated only with enhanced visuo-spatial imagery. These data are consistent with the time-space connectivity thesis that time-space synesthesia results from enhanced connectivity in the parietal lobe between regions supporting the representation of temporal sequences and those underlying visuo-spatial imagery.     

Reduced audiovisual integration in synesthesia – evidence from bimodal speech perception

Recent research suggests synesthesia as a result of a hypersensitive multimodal binding mechanism. To address the question whether multimodal integration is altered in synesthetes in general, grapheme‐colour and auditory‐visual synesthetes were investigated using speech‐related stimulation in two behavioural experiments. First, we used the McGurk illusion to test the strength and number of illusory perceptions in synesthesia. In a second step, we analysed the gain in speech perception coming from seen articulatory movements under acoustically noisy conditions. We used disyllabic nouns as stimulation and varied signal‐to‐noise ratio of the auditory stream presented concurrently to a matching video of the speaker. We hypothesized that if synesthesia is due to a general hyperbinding mechanism this group of subjects should be more susceptible to McGurk illusions and profit more from the visual information during audiovisual speech perception. The results indicate that there are differences between synesthetes and controls concerning multisensory integration – but in the opposite direction as hypothesized. Synesthetes showed a reduced number of illusions and had a reduced gain in comprehension by viewing matching articulatory movements in comparison to control subjects. Our results indicate that rather than having a hypersensitive binding mechanism, synesthetes show weaker integration of vision and audition.     

On cross-modal similarity: auditory-visual interactions in speeded discrimination

A series of four experiments explored how cross-modal similarities between sensory attributes in vision and hearing reveal themselves in speeded, two-stimulus discrimination. When subjects responded differentially to stimuli on one modality, speed and accuracy of response were greater on trials accompanied by informationally irrelevant "matching" versus "mismatching" stimuli from the other modality. Cross-modal interactions appeared in (a) responses to dim/bright lights and to dark/light colors accompanied by low-pitched/high-pitched tones; (b) responses to low-pitched/high-pitched tones accompanied by dim/bright lights or by dark/light colors; (c) responses to dim/bright lights, but not to dark/light colors, accompanied by soft/loud sounds; and (d) responses to rounded/sharp forms accompanied by low-pitched/high-pitched tones. These results concur with findings on cross-modal perception, synesthesia, and synesthetic metaphor, which reveal similarities between pitch and brightness, pitch and lightness, loudness and brightness, and pitch and form. The cross-modal interactions in response speed and accuracy may take place at a sensory/perceptual level of processing or after sensory stimuli are encoded semantically.