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Perception of Self-Motion From Peripheral Optokinetic Stimulation Suppresses Visual Evoked Responses to Central Stimuli

¹ University Laboratory of Physiology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3PT, United Kingdom; ² Department of Neurology, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Theodor-Stern-Kai 7, D-60590 Frankfurt, Germany; ³ Medical Research Council Spatial Disorientation Group, Academic Department of Neuro-Otology, Division of Neuroscience and Psychological Medicine, Imperial College London, Charing Cross Campus, London W6 8RF, United Kingdom

Submitted 2 October 2002; accepted in final form 29 March 2003

In a previous functional neuroimaging study we found that early visual areas deactivated when a rotating optical flow stimulus elicited the illusion of self-motion (vection) compared with when it was perceived as a moving object. Here, we investigated whether electrical cortical responses to an independent central visual probe stimulus change as a function of whether optical flow stimulation in the periphery induces the illusion of self-motion or not. Visual-evoked potentials (VEPs) were obtained in response to pattern-reversals in the central visual field in the presence of a constant peripheral large-field optokinetic stimulus that rotated around the naso-occipital axis and induced intermittent sensations of vection. As control, VEPs were also recorded during a stationary peripheral stimulus and showed no difference than those obtained during optokinetic stimulation. The VEPs during constant peripheral stimulation were then divided into two groups according to the time spans where the subjects reported object- or self-motion, respectively. The N70 VEP component showed a significant amplitude reduction when, due to the peripheral stimulus, subjects experienced self-motion compared to when the peripheral stimulus was perceived as object-motion. This finding supplements and corroborates our recent evidence from functional neuroimaging that early visual cortex deactivates when a visual flow stimulus elicits the illusion of self-motion compared with when the same sensory input is interpreted as object-motion. This dampened responsiveness might reflect a redistribution of sensorial and attentional resources when the monitoring of self-motion relies on a sustained and veridical processing of optic flow and may be compromised by other sources of visual input.