At any given moment, we experience a perceptual scene as a single whole and yet we may distinguish a variety of objects within it. This phenomenon instantiates two properties of conscious perception: integration and differentiation. Integration is the property of experiencing a collection of objects as a unitary percept and differentiation is the property of experiencing these objects as distinct from each other. Here, we evaluated the neural information dynamics underlying integration and differentiation of perceptual contents during bistable perception. Participants listened to a sequence of tones (auditory bistable stimuli) experienced either as a single stream (perceptual integration) or as two parallel streams (perceptual differentiation) of sounds. We computed neurophysiological indices of information integration and information differentiation with electroencephalographic and intracranial recordings. When perceptual alternations were endogenously driven, the integrated percept was associated with an increase in neural information integration and a decrease in neural differentiation across frontoparietal regions, whereas the opposite pattern was observed for the differentiated percept. However, when perception was exogenously driven by a change in the sound stream (no bistability), neural oscillatory power distinguished between percepts but information measures did not. We demonstrate that perceptual integration and differentiation can be mapped to theoretically motivated neural information signatures, suggesting a direct relationship between phenomenology and neurophysiology.

中文翻译：

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双稳态感知过程中感知整合和分化的可分离神经信息动力学。

在任何给定时刻，我们都会将感知场景视为一个整体，但我们可以区分其中的各种对象。这种现象实例化了有意识知觉的两个特性：整合和分化。整合是将对象集合体验为单一感知的特性，而差异化是将这些对象体验为彼此不同的特性。在这里，我们评估了双稳态感知过程中感知内容整合和分化的神经信息动力学。参与者聆听一系列音调（听觉双稳态刺激），这些音调体验为单个声音流（感知整合）或两个平行的声音流（感知分化）。我们通过脑电图和颅内记录计算了信息整合和信息分化的神经生理学指标。当感知交替被内源性驱动时，整合的感知与神经信息整合的增加和额顶区域的神经分化的减少有关，而在分化的感知中观察到相反的模式。然而，当感知是由声音流的变化（无双稳态）外源性驱动时，神经振荡功率区分感知但信息测量没有。我们证明知觉整合和分化可以映射到理论上动机的神经信息特征，表明现象学和神经生理学之间存在直接关系。