Left and right visual field advantages are a function of scotopic and photopic retinal adaptation, respectively, in simple reaction time to near-threshold targets.
Modulation of stimulus luminance in a tachistoscopic face discrimination task has been found to significantly invert visual hemifield advantage in reaction time (RT) (Sergent, 1982a, Sergent, 1982b). However, there is no more physiological rationale for that than for a similar effect, say, of retinal adaptation, and it is even conceivable that the latter may have confounded the former in past experiments. The experiments reported here were therefore designed to tease out the relative contributions of stimulus luminance and of background illumination (i.e., retinal adaptation) in a simple RT task. Two equally difficult conditions of dim targets were set up, one with light-adapted subjects and one with dark-adapted subjects. Similarly, two equally difficult conditions of bright targets were set up with light and dark-adapted subjects. It was found that dim targets (near detection threshold) yielded a significant right visual field RT advantage in light-adapted subjects and that dim targets (equally near detection threshold) yielded a significant left visual field RT advantage in dark-adapted subjects. Future experiments will determine whether cone-mediated RT to detection is left hemisphere dominant and whether rod-mediated RT to detection is right hemisphere dominant.