Kaiser Lab
@dkaiserlab.bsky.social
Studying natural vision at JLU Giessen using psychophysics, neuroimaging, and computational models, PI: Daniel Kaiser.
danielkaiser.net
danielkaiser.net
Pinned
Kaiser Lab
@dkaiserlab.bsky.social
· Dec 16
Hello Bluesky! This is the Kaiser Lab.
We are cognitive neuroscientists studying the neural computations that support real-world vision using fMRI, EEG, and TMS. Our main research areas include individual differences, categorization, and aesthetics.
For more information: danielkaiser.net
We are cognitive neuroscientists studying the neural computations that support real-world vision using fMRI, EEG, and TMS. Our main research areas include individual differences, categorization, and aesthetics.
For more information: danielkaiser.net
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
Check out @alpekinci.bsky.social 's preprint: “Shared gaze reflects shared aesthetic experiences” #neuroaesthetics 👀
Check out @alpekinci.bsky.social 's preprint: “Shared gaze reflects shared aesthetic experiences” #neuroaesthetics 👀
New preprint!
Why do people disagree about what looks beautiful, even when viewing the same stimulus?
We show that shared aesthetic experience is linked to shared gaze during naturalistic viewing: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
1/4
Why do people disagree about what looks beautiful, even when viewing the same stimulus?
We show that shared aesthetic experience is linked to shared gaze during naturalistic viewing: www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
1/4
www.biorxiv.org
February 12, 2026 at 10:35 AM
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
Check out @alpekinci.bsky.social 's preprint: “Shared gaze reflects shared aesthetic experiences” #neuroaesthetics 👀
Check out @alpekinci.bsky.social 's preprint: “Shared gaze reflects shared aesthetic experiences” #neuroaesthetics 👀
📢 Workshop announcement.
We are super excited to announce the workshop Perceptual Inferences, from philosophy to neuroscience, organized by Alexander Schütz and Daniel Kaiser.
📍 Rauischholzhausen Castle, near Marburg, Germany
🗓️ June 8 to 10, 2026.
1/4
We are super excited to announce the workshop Perceptual Inferences, from philosophy to neuroscience, organized by Alexander Schütz and Daniel Kaiser.
📍 Rauischholzhausen Castle, near Marburg, Germany
🗓️ June 8 to 10, 2026.
1/4
February 10, 2026 at 9:00 AM
📢 Workshop announcement.
We are super excited to announce the workshop Perceptual Inferences, from philosophy to neuroscience, organized by Alexander Schütz and Daniel Kaiser.
📍 Rauischholzhausen Castle, near Marburg, Germany
🗓️ June 8 to 10, 2026.
1/4
We are super excited to announce the workshop Perceptual Inferences, from philosophy to neuroscience, organized by Alexander Schütz and Daniel Kaiser.
📍 Rauischholzhausen Castle, near Marburg, Germany
🗓️ June 8 to 10, 2026.
1/4
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
Check out @suzibot.bsky.social's preprint: “Visual search is constrained by the variability of object-category templates.”
Includes some neat findings on individual differences in search 👀
Check out @suzibot.bsky.social's preprint: “Visual search is constrained by the variability of object-category templates.”
Includes some neat findings on individual differences in search 👀
🧨 Preprint alert
Is it easier to find a ball than a shoe? The answer lies in how variable we think these objects are in the real-world. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
w/ the amazing @dkaiserlab.bsky.social & @luchunyeh.bsky.social 🦄
🧵1/8
Is it easier to find a ball than a shoe? The answer lies in how variable we think these objects are in the real-world. www.biorxiv.org/content/10.6...
w/ the amazing @dkaiserlab.bsky.social & @luchunyeh.bsky.social 🦄
🧵1/8
www.biorxiv.org
February 9, 2026 at 11:13 AM
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
Check out @suzibot.bsky.social's preprint: “Visual search is constrained by the variability of object-category templates.”
Includes some neat findings on individual differences in search 👀
Check out @suzibot.bsky.social's preprint: “Visual search is constrained by the variability of object-category templates.”
Includes some neat findings on individual differences in search 👀
We’re happy to announce that Gongting Wang has successfully defended his PhD thesis at Freie Universität Berlin. Congratulations, Dr. Wang! 🎉
January 27, 2026 at 10:20 AM
We’re happy to announce that Gongting Wang has successfully defended his PhD thesis at Freie Universität Berlin. Congratulations, Dr. Wang! 🎉
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
🚨 New preprints out!🚨
Excited to share two new preprints from my #MSCA project. With Daniel @dkaiserlab.bsky.social , Marius @peelen.bsky.social , and Belma Seferovic, we show how contextual associations shape real-world object representations and guide everyday visual task performance.
👇👇👇 1/n
Excited to share two new preprints from my #MSCA project. With Daniel @dkaiserlab.bsky.social , Marius @peelen.bsky.social , and Belma Seferovic, we show how contextual associations shape real-world object representations and guide everyday visual task performance.
👇👇👇 1/n
December 16, 2025 at 3:27 PM
🚨 Preprint alert! 🚨
Check out @michaengesee.bsky.social 's preprint on individual differences in expectations about natural scenes and how they shape how we perceive and neurally represent scenes. 👁️🧠👨🦱👩🦰👩🦳
I’m excited to share the first preprint from my PhD project!
Together with Daniel Kaiser (@dkaiserlab.bsky.social), we investigated how internal models shape inter-individual differences in the perception and neural processing of natural scenes.
Preprint: osf.io/preprints/ps...
1/n
Together with Daniel Kaiser (@dkaiserlab.bsky.social), we investigated how internal models shape inter-individual differences in the perception and neural processing of natural scenes.
Preprint: osf.io/preprints/ps...
1/n
December 8, 2025 at 10:20 AM
Check out @michaengesee.bsky.social 's preprint on individual differences in expectations about natural scenes and how they shape how we perceive and neurally represent scenes. 👁️🧠👨🦱👩🦰👩🦳
2025 - Christmas Party Crew! 🎄
December 8, 2025 at 10:11 AM
2025 - Christmas Party Crew! 🎄
Super happy to announce that our Research Training Group "PIMON" is funded by the @dfg.de ! Starting in October, we will have exciting opportunities for PhD students that want to explore object and material perception & interaction in Gießen @jlugiessen.bsky.social ! Just look at this amazing team!
December 3, 2025 at 12:46 PM
Super happy to announce that our Research Training Group "PIMON" is funded by the @dfg.de ! Starting in October, we will have exciting opportunities for PhD students that want to explore object and material perception & interaction in Gießen @jlugiessen.bsky.social ! Just look at this amazing team!
Reposted by Kaiser Lab
I am very excited to share our new preprint, spearheaded by the brilliant @lunahuestegge.bsky.social, w/ @peterkok.bsky.social and others: ‘An attempt to push mental imagery over the reality threshold using non-invasive brain stimulation’
doi.org/10.31234/osf...
doi.org/10.31234/osf...
OSF
doi.org
November 27, 2025 at 10:53 AM
I am very excited to share our new preprint, spearheaded by the brilliant @lunahuestegge.bsky.social, w/ @peterkok.bsky.social and others: ‘An attempt to push mental imagery over the reality threshold using non-invasive brain stimulation’
doi.org/10.31234/osf...
doi.org/10.31234/osf...
Reposted by Kaiser Lab
Decoding the rhythmic representation and communication of visual contents
www.cell.com/trends/neuro...
#neuroscience
www.cell.com/trends/neuro...
#neuroscience
Decoding the rhythmic representation and communication of visual contents
Rhythmic neural activity is considered essential for adaptively modulating responses
in the visual system. In this opinion article we posit that visual brain rhythms also
serve a key function in the r...
www.cell.com
October 30, 2025 at 11:59 AM
Decoding the rhythmic representation and communication of visual contents
www.cell.com/trends/neuro...
#neuroscience
www.cell.com/trends/neuro...
#neuroscience
From Micha’s farewell gathering before his temporary leave 💫 - he’ll still be missed!
October 22, 2025 at 12:24 PM
From Micha’s farewell gathering before his temporary leave 💫 - he’ll still be missed!
A few snapshots from this year’s Kaiser Lab retreat 🌿🧠✨
October 14, 2025 at 10:47 AM
A few snapshots from this year’s Kaiser Lab retreat 🌿🧠✨
By utilizing the visual backward masking paradigm, this study aimed to disentangle the contributions of feedforward and recurrent processing, revealing that recurrent processing significantly shapes the object representations across the ventral visual stream.
journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
Recurrence affects the geometry of visual representations across the ventral visual stream in the human brain
The specific roles of feedforward and recurrent processing in human visual object recognition remain incompletely understood. In this neuroimaging and computational modelling study the authors isolate...
journals.plos.org
October 10, 2025 at 2:36 PM
By utilizing the visual backward masking paradigm, this study aimed to disentangle the contributions of feedforward and recurrent processing, revealing that recurrent processing significantly shapes the object representations across the ventral visual stream.
journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
journals.plos.org/plosbiology/...
Reposted by Kaiser Lab
How can we characterize the contents of our internal models of the world? We highlight participant-driven approaches, from drawings to descriptions, to study how we expect scenes to look! 🤩
From line drawings to scene perception — our new review argues for moving beyond experimenter-driven manipulations toward participant-driven approaches to reveal what’s in our internal models of the visual world. 👁️✍️🛋
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Characterizing internal models of the visual environment | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Despite the complexity of real-world environments, natural vision is seamlessly efficient.
To explain this efficiency, researchers often use predictive processing frameworks,
in which perceptual effic...
royalsocietypublishing.org
October 8, 2025 at 9:27 AM
How can we characterize the contents of our internal models of the world? We highlight participant-driven approaches, from drawings to descriptions, to study how we expect scenes to look! 🤩
Reposted by Kaiser Lab
In this paper we present flexible methods for participants to express their expectations about natural scenes.
From line drawings to scene perception — our new review argues for moving beyond experimenter-driven manipulations toward participant-driven approaches to reveal what’s in our internal models of the visual world. 👁️✍️🛋
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Characterizing internal models of the visual environment | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Despite the complexity of real-world environments, natural vision is seamlessly efficient.
To explain this efficiency, researchers often use predictive processing frameworks,
in which perceptual effic...
royalsocietypublishing.org
October 8, 2025 at 9:13 AM
In this paper we present flexible methods for participants to express their expectations about natural scenes.
From line drawings to scene perception — our new review argues for moving beyond experimenter-driven manipulations toward participant-driven approaches to reveal what’s in our internal models of the visual world. 👁️✍️🛋
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Characterizing internal models of the visual environment | Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences
Despite the complexity of real-world environments, natural vision is seamlessly efficient.
To explain this efficiency, researchers often use predictive processing frameworks,
in which perceptual effic...
royalsocietypublishing.org
October 8, 2025 at 9:07 AM
From line drawings to scene perception — our new review argues for moving beyond experimenter-driven manipulations toward participant-driven approaches to reveal what’s in our internal models of the visual world. 👁️✍️🛋
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/...
Kaiser Lab is at ECVP this year! Come check out our studies 😎
August 25, 2025 at 8:24 AM
Kaiser Lab is at ECVP this year! Come check out our studies 😎
Go Lu!! Congratulations 💜
Honored and thrilled to receive the GGN Early Career Award @jlugiessen.bsky.social 🏆 Huge thanks to my awesome supervisors Daniel @dkaiserlab.bsky.social & Marius @peelen.bsky.social , all my collaborators, and the amazing colleagues from both labs — couldn’t have done it without you! 💗
June 26, 2025 at 6:35 PM
Go Lu!! Congratulations 💜
We had an awesome time discussing the role of feedback in perception @unil.bsky.social 🧠 and exploring the beautiful city of Lausanne! 💜🏞️ Thanks to @icepfl.bsky.social @davidpascucci.bsky.social
June 26, 2025 at 6:34 PM
We had an awesome time discussing the role of feedback in perception @unil.bsky.social 🧠 and exploring the beautiful city of Lausanne! 💜🏞️ Thanks to @icepfl.bsky.social @davidpascucci.bsky.social
All-topographic ANNs! Now out in @nathumbehav.nature.com , led by @zejinlu.bsky.social , in collaboration with @timkietzmann.bsky.social.
See below for a summary 👇
See below for a summary 👇
Now out in Nature Human Behaviour @nathumbehav.nature.com : “End-to-end topographic networks as models of cortical map formation and human visual behaviour”. Please check our NHB link: www.nature.com/articles/s41...
June 6, 2025 at 1:09 PM
All-topographic ANNs! Now out in @nathumbehav.nature.com , led by @zejinlu.bsky.social , in collaboration with @timkietzmann.bsky.social.
See below for a summary 👇
See below for a summary 👇
Don’t miss out again! If you are interested in our studies presented at @VSSMtg , you can find our posters here: 👇
drive.google.com/drive/mobile...
drive.google.com/drive/mobile...
May 28, 2025 at 8:48 AM
Don’t miss out again! If you are interested in our studies presented at @VSSMtg , you can find our posters here: 👇
drive.google.com/drive/mobile...
drive.google.com/drive/mobile...
Kaiser Lab goes #Exzellenz! The excellence cluster „The Adaptive Mind“ got funding for the next 7 years! Proud to be part of this awesome team and looking forward to all the exciting research to come. 🎆✨🥂
May 23, 2025 at 11:44 AM
Kaiser Lab goes #Exzellenz! The excellence cluster „The Adaptive Mind“ got funding for the next 7 years! Proud to be part of this awesome team and looking forward to all the exciting research to come. 🎆✨🥂
#VSS2025 was a blast - great science, fun people, beach vibes. We‘ll be back! @vssmtg.bsky.social
May 22, 2025 at 3:37 PM
#VSS2025 was a blast - great science, fun people, beach vibes. We‘ll be back! @vssmtg.bsky.social
Reposted by Kaiser Lab
How fast do we extract distance cues from scenes 🛤️🏞️🏜️ and integrate them with retinal size 🧸🐻 to infer real object size? Our new EEG study in Cortex has answers! w/ @dkaiserlab.bsky.social @suryagayet.bsky.social @peelen.bsky.social
Check it out: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Check it out: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
The neural time course of size constancy in natural scenes
Accurate real-world size perception relies on size constancy, a mechanism that integrates an object's retinal size with distance information. The neur…
www.sciencedirect.com
May 17, 2025 at 12:21 PM
How fast do we extract distance cues from scenes 🛤️🏞️🏜️ and integrate them with retinal size 🧸🐻 to infer real object size? Our new EEG study in Cortex has answers! w/ @dkaiserlab.bsky.social @suryagayet.bsky.social @peelen.bsky.social
Check it out: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
Check it out: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...
We are at @vssmtg.bsky.social 2025. 🏖️☀️🍹come check out our studies!
May 15, 2025 at 9:04 AM
We are at @vssmtg.bsky.social 2025. 🏖️☀️🍹come check out our studies!