When a bistable visual image, such as the Necker cube, is continuously viewed, the percept of the image endogenously alternates between one possible percept and the other. However, perceptual alternation can also be induced by an exogenous perturbation. For example, a typical external perturbation is the flashlight, which is expected to pervasively activate many brain regions. Therefore, the neural mechanism related to exogenous perceptual alternation remains to be clarified. As a cue to solving this problem, our recent psychophysiological experiment reported a positive correlation between the enhancement of visual mismatch negativity evoked by breaks in the sequential regularity of the visual stimuli and the proportion of perceptual alternation. To elucidate the mechanism underlying exogenous perceptual alternation induced by visual mismatch negativity, the present study attempted to construct a neural network model for bistable perception of the Necker cube, whose perceptual alternation is facilitated by an increase in visual mismatch negativity. The model consists of both a prediction layer and a prediction error layer, following the predictive coding framework for biologically plausible relationships between the change detection process and the perceptual alternation mechanism. Computer simulations showed that the mean duration of perception decreased as the response increased, which is in concordance with the experimental data. This result suggested that the excitatory feedforward and inhibitory feedback connections play an important role. Additionally, the validity of this model suggests that the visual mismatch signal propagates in the neural systems and affects the visual perceptual mechanism as a prediction error signal.

中文翻译：

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Necker立方体的外在感知交替的神经网络模型

当连续观看双稳态视觉图像（例如Necker立方体）时，图像的感知会在一个可能的感知和另一个感知之间内生地交替。但是，外来的扰动也可能引起知觉交替。例如，典型的外部干扰是手电筒，它有望普遍激活许多大脑区域。因此，与外源性知觉交替有关的神经机制仍有待阐明。作为解决此问题的提示，我们最近的心理生理学实验报道了视觉刺激顺序不规则所引起的视觉失配阴性增强与知觉交替比例之间存在正相关。为了阐明视觉失配否定性诱发外源性知觉交替的潜在机制，本研究试图构建神经网络模型以对Necker立方体进行双稳态感知，其视觉交替由视觉失配否定性增加促进。该模型由预测层和预测错误层组成，遵循预测编码框架，以实现变化检测过程与感知交替机制之间的生物学上合理的关系。计算机仿真表明，随着响应的增加，感知的平均持续时间减少，这与实验数据一致。该结果表明，兴奋性前馈和抑制性反馈联系起着重要作用。另外，