The absolute efficiency of perceptual decisions

Abstract

Our perceptions of the world around us are stable and reliable. Is this because the mechanisms that yield them are crude and insensitive, and thus immune to false responses? Or is it because a statistical censor that blocks unreliable messages intervenes between the signals from our sense organs and our knowledge of them? This question can be answered by measuring the efficiency with which statistical information is utilized in perception. It is shown that mirror symmetry can be detected in displays of otherwise random dots with an efficiency of up to 50 %; thus the statistical mechanisms are not crude and insensitive, and this aspect of sensory physiology and psychology may deserve more attention.