News Section | Neurobiology
Owl study helps in better understanding of human stereovision
With the help of an owl model, a new research study has revealed the advantage of stereopsis, commonly referred to as stereovision, is its ability to discriminate between objects and background, and not in perceiving absolute depth.
The owl model was taken into consideration because owls see in stereo much like humans do.
The purpose of the study, which was conducted at RWTH Aachen (Germany) and Radboud University (Nijmegen, Netherlands), was to uncover how depth perception came into existence during the course of evolution.
“The reason why studying owl vision is helpful is that, like humans, owls have two frontally placed eyes,” said author Robert F. van der Willigen, of Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behavior at Radboud.
“As a result, owls, like humans, could appreciate the 3-dimensional shape of tangible objects through simultaneous comparison of the left and right eye,” added Willigen.
Willigen studied two trained barn owls (Tyto alba) by conducting a series of six behavioural experiments equivalent to those used on humans. The results provided unprecedented data on stereovision, with findings that debunk the long-held consensus that the evolutionary advantage of seeing in stereo must be depth vision.
He contends the findings demonstrate that while binocular disparity, the slight difference between the viewpoints of the right and left eyes, does play a role in perceiving depth, it allows owls, like humans, to perceive relative depth rather than absolute distance.
“It is useful, therefore, not so much in controlling goal-directed movements as it is in recognition,” he added.
The findings have been published in the Vision article.
Disclaimer: Bioscholar is not intended to provide medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. The articles are based on peer reviewed research, and discoveries/products mentioned in the articles may not be approved by the regulatory bodies.