Conscious perception of natural images is constrained by category-related visual features

Conscious perception is crucial for adaptive behaviour yet access to consciousness varies for different types of objects. The visual system comprises regions with widely distributed category information and exemplar-level representations that cluster according to category. Does this categorical organisation in the brain provide insight into object-specific access to consciousness? We address this question using the Attentional Blink approach with visual objects as targets. We find large differences across categories in the attentional blink. We then employ activation patterns extracted from a deep convolutional neural network to reveal that these differences depend on mid- to high-level, rather than low-level, visual features. We further show that these visual features can be used to explain variance in performance across trials. Taken together, our results suggest that the specific organisation of the higher-tier visual system underlies important functions relevant for conscious perception of differing natural images. Visual objects from similar semantic categories present activity patterns that cluster together in higher visual areas. The authors show that conscious access differs between semantic categories and is driven by category-related visual features commonly associated with processing in higher level visual areas.