A novel texture backward masking method to locate critical recurrent processes in human vision

Mounting evidence suggests that recurrent processes in the visual system play a critical role during challenging recognition tasks. Backward masking techniques have traditionally been used as a non-invasive method for studying recurrent processes: A mask follows the target image, presumably disrupting ongoing processes. However, these techniques have the limitation that they do not allow the identification of the stage of the visual system at which critical recurrent processes are taking place. Here, leveraging advances in texture synthesis via deep networks, and the approximate correspondence between stages of the visual system and layers of deep networks, we develop a novel psychophysics p