Adaptation to textured chromatic fields.

Probe-flash threshold curves were used to show that adaptation to textured fields consists not only of adaptation to the steady local constituents but also of a process that is similar to habituation to prolonged temporal modulation, which in this case could be caused by miniature eye movements across element boundaries. The response curves derived from probe-flash thresholds are compressive on both sides of the adaptation level after adaptation to spatially uniform fields but have an accelerating form when they are measured after adaptation to textured backgrounds. This change is suggestive of a response equalization process, which modifies the response function of each mechanism to match the cumulative frequency distribution of its inputs.