Lower Internal Additive Noise and Better Perceptual Template Characterize Binocular Contrast Sensitivity Summation

Abstract

Binocular summation is generally defined as the superiority of binocular over monocular performance. Here, we investigated how external noise modulates the effect of binocular summation on the contrast sensitivity function (CSF) and clarified the corresponding mechanisms with a perceptual template model (PTM). The contrast sensitivity (CS) over 10 spatial frequencies and three external noise levels was assessed under one binocular and two monocular viewing conditions. The binocular summation ratio (BSR) was calculated by dividing the area under the log CSF (AULCSF), or the CS of using both eyes, by that of only using the “good eye” (BSRG) or the “bad eye” (BSRB), respectively. We found that: (1) based on the AULCSF, the BSRB was higher than the BSRG; (2) based on the AULCSF, the BSR was more pronounced under zero-noise than under low-noise conditions, but the BSR was not higher than 1 under high-noise conditions due to a large individual difference; (3) based on the CS, with increasing spatial frequencies, the BSRB steadily increased; (4) both decreased internal additive noise and an improved perceptual template accounted for the gain in binocular summation. These results help us better understand the features of binocular CS and shed light on the clinical studies on populations with monocular CS loss.