Pascal Mamassian
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mamassian.bsky.social
Pascal Mamassian
@mamassian.bsky.social
I’m studying visual perception, mostly using psychophysics. I work for the CNRS at the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris.
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
Excellent chimeric face image showing off a left visual field bias for face processing - this image will tend to look more like John Travolta to observers, but the next one (see following post in this thread)... <1/2>
Respond with the same actor as a hero and villain.
November 4, 2025 at 9:18 PM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
A new addition to my “Visual Phenomena and Optical Illusions” collection: “Mainz-Linez”. Here's the live demonstration and explanation of the somewhat mysterious title: michaelbach.de/ot/mot-Mainz.... Enjoy!
October 31, 2025 at 9:34 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
A new, Short and Sweet open-access paper on how briefly hiding the hand impedes goal-directed arm movements. Briefly is really brief: we find a decrease in performance in goal-directed movements due to just a few ms without vision of the hand (target remains visible). doi.org/10.1177/0301...
October 27, 2025 at 10:49 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
[PhD track in Cognitive Science at Département d'Études Cognitives, ENS-PSL]

Applications are now open for the PSL PhD Track 2026–2027 in Cognitive Science!
This 5-year integrated program is aimed at talented students eager to tackle the scientific challenges of the future and to start shaping 1/2
PhD track in cognitive science | PSL
Faire un don
psl.eu
October 23, 2025 at 12:46 PM
Heureux de venir parler des bases neuroscientifiques et psychologiques de la synesthésie (cette confusion des sens), le mercredi 15 octobre à 10h30, dans le cadre de l’exposition Kandinksy à la Philharmonie de Paris

philharmoniedeparis.fr/fr/activite/...
Les sens de la musique
philharmoniedeparis.fr
October 13, 2025 at 6:19 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
How about in this case?
Surprisingly, most people *predominantly see 180° motion*, while 360° motion is hardly, if ever, perceived – even though the rings move in the same way as above!
[3/6]
October 3, 2025 at 2:28 PM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
"This integration supports the conclusion that time may be the fundamental dimension along which the brain organizes its sensorium..."

Fantastic review by Pawan Sinha and colleagues (@lukasvogelsang.bsky.social @marinv.bsky.social)

doi.org/10.1146/annu...
The Temporal Scaffolding of Sensory Organization
How a developing nervous system discovers meaning in complex sensory inputs has typically been examined separately for each sensory modality. Even as studies have uncovered modality-specific strategie...
doi.org
October 2, 2025 at 3:03 PM
Delighted to share this work led by Thomas Schaffhauser on the processing of rich natural-like motion stimuli (“motion clouds”) in the visual cortex of the ferret:

www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1...

This work was done with Yves Boubenec at the @lsp-ens.bsky.social.

[1/3]
Encoding and combining naturalistic motion cues in the ferret higher visual cortex
Natural visual scenes contain rich flows of pattern motion that vary not only in orientation but also in spatial sizes and temporal rhythms. To properly interpret the motion, the brain must extract in...
www.biorxiv.org
September 26, 2025 at 4:39 PM
A nice shift in perceived colour between central and peripheral vision. The fixated disc looks purple while the others look blue.

The effect presumably comes from the absence of S-cones in the fovea.

From Hinnerk Schulz-Hildebrandt:
arxiv.org/pdf/2509.115...
September 24, 2025 at 12:04 PM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
Brightness induced by motion
Instruction: Without blinking, follow the green ball :)

live version with shader code:
www.shadertoy.com/view/tc2fDD

#illusion #perception
September 24, 2025 at 8:00 AM
A beautiful painting from Georges de la Tour where the coat’s grey paint appears blue because of the dominant yellow colour in the canvas.

It took another two centuries for Eugène Chevreul to describe the laws of simultaneous contrast, used later by Vincent van Gogh, Sonia Delaunay, and others.
The new Georges de la Tour exhibition at the Jacquemart-André Museum has begun! A virtuoso technique used to meditate on the human condition.This coat of Saint Thomas contains no blue, only grey coulours; it is an optical illusion created by the adjacent yellow.
September 12, 2025 at 8:41 PM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
My Research Highlight on an important study assessing large-scale evidence for perceptual entrainment to auditory rhythms is now out,
emphasizing the importance of replications, sample sizes and variability across individuals and labs @natureportfolio.nature.com

rdcu.be/eFODC
Neuroscience: large-scale evidence for perceptual entrainment to auditory rhythms
Communications Psychology - A large multi-lab replication study confirms that rhythmic sounds can entrain perceptual performance, while revealing substantial inter-individual variability.
rdcu.be
September 12, 2025 at 10:42 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
#PressRelease 🗞️ The 2025 CNRS Gold Medal has been awarded to Stéphane Mallat, recognised the world over for his research on mathematics applied to signal processing and artificial intelligence.

👉 cnrs.fr/en/press/bet...

#CNRStalents 🏅
September 11, 2025 at 9:31 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
The diamond appears to move.
September 8, 2025 at 10:15 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
In this short letter we explain why binding problems occur in the brain and why deep neural networks need to cope with them. We respond to Scholte and de Haan (TICS 2025), who claimed the opposite.

lnkd.in/euNaS6eu
September 7, 2025 at 7:45 AM
Forget random-dot motion and drifting gratings, embrace "Motion Clouds", the motion stimulus of the 21st century!

by:
Andrew Meso
Jonathan Vacher, @jon-v.bsky.social
Nikos Gekas
Pascal Mamassian, @mamassian.bsky.social
Laurent Perrinet, @laurentperrinet.bsky.social
Guillaume Masson
🚀 Excited to share our new paper:

> "DynTex: A real-time generative model of dynamic naturalistic luminance textures"

...now published in Journal of Vision!

Read it here: doi.org/10.1167/jov....

#DynamicTextures #ComputationalNeuroscience #ComputerVision #OpenScience
September 4, 2025 at 7:57 AM
Congratulations, very impressive collaborative work!

The published results are already interesting, but the open-source data will undoubtedly be very useful in the future.
September 4, 2025 at 7:47 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
As #ECVP2025 wraps up, I’m delighted that #ECVP2028 in Paris was accepted at the Business Meeting! ECVP will meet again before but the Parisian organizing committee is already planning an unforgettable 50th anniversary!
August 29, 2025 at 4:01 PM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
Already halfway through the fantastic @ecvp.bsky.social‬ conference in Mainz!

It started beautifully with the Perception Lecture given by Astrid Kappers.

Looking forward to reading the paper linked to the lecture that will be published in Perception!
August 26, 2025 at 6:02 PM
Very sad to hear that Michael Kubovy passed away on 21 August 2025.

It is a great loss to perceptual science. His book "The Psychology of Perspective and Renaissance Art" remains unparalleled.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael...
Michael Kubovy - Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org
August 22, 2025 at 9:04 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
🚨 New article in #NCONSC

Confidence in auditory perceptual completion
academic.oup.com/nc/article/2...

From Cemre Baykan, Pascal Mamassian & Alexander C Schütz

#consciousness
🧠🧪
Confidence in auditory perceptual completion
Abstract. Previous studies examining confidence in perceptual completion in vision showed that observers can be unaware of missing sensory information and
academic.oup.com
August 17, 2025 at 3:31 PM
Everything you always wanted to know about color, but were afraid to ask.

A superb, highly didactic video, now in English!
New video in English! 🎉

What are colours? Do they form a particular geometry? Can we build this geometry from our perceptions? 🖌️🎨

All the answers in 20 minutes!
youtu.be/7KYwi2F5Ce4
The "Geometry" of Colours
YouTube video by ScienceClic English
youtu.be
July 9, 2025 at 6:21 AM
Tout ce que vous avez toujours voulu savoir sur la perception des couleurs sans jamais oser le demander.

Une superbe vidéo très didactique d'Alessandro Roussel.
Nouvelle vidéo !! 🖌️🎨

Que sont les couleurs ? Forment-elles une géométrie particulière ? Peut-on construire cette géométrie à partir de nos perceptions ?

Toutes ces réponses en 20 minutes !
youtu.be/NuDhD6-4ZQI
La "Géométrie" des Couleurs
YouTube video by ScienceClic
youtu.be
July 7, 2025 at 7:54 AM
Reposted by Pascal Mamassian
Experimentology is out today!!! A group of us wrote a free online textbook for experimental methods, available at experimentology.io - the idea was to integrate open science into all aspects of the experimental workflow from planning to design, analysis, and writing.
July 1, 2025 at 6:26 PM
"As appealing as they can be, Large Language Models are as useful to scientific research as microwaves are to fine
cuisine."

doi.org/10.1177/0301...
Using AI for peer reviewing is like using a microwave to reheat an old meal - Pascal Mamassian, 2025
doi.org
June 13, 2025 at 7:34 AM