Data from: Temporal integration by multi-level regularities fosters the emergence of dynamic conscious experience

Here, we investigated whether and how information integration over time by incorporating the underlying regularities contributes to our awareness of the dynamic world. Using binocular rivalry, we demonstrated that structured visual streams, constituted by shape, motion, or idiom sequences containing perceptual- or semantic-level regularities, predominated over their non-structured but otherwise matched counterparts in the competition for visual awareness.

Despite the apparent resemblance, a substantial dissociation of the observed rivalry advantages emerged between perceptual- and semantic-level regularities – these effects stem respectively from nonconscious and conscious temporal integration processes, with the former but not the latter being vulnerable to perturbations in the spatiotemporal integration window. These findings corroborate the essential role of structure-guided information integration in visual awareness and highlight a multi-level mechanism where temporal integration by perceptually and semantically defined regularities fosters the emergence of continuous conscious experience.