Pinar Demirayak¹, Pauline Stewart¹, Elam Cutts¹, Madeline Ragland¹, Elliot Maxwell¹, Marcello Maninglia², Samyukta Jayakumar³, Jaap Munneke⁴, Nicholas Turk-Browne⁵, Aaron Seitz⁴, Kristina Visscher¹; ¹University of Alabama at Birmingham, ²Rochester Institute of Technology, ³University of California at Riverside, ⁴Northeastern University, ⁵Yale University

People who experience central vision loss due to retinal damage in the macula frequently adopt a spontaneous “preferred retinal locus” outside the damaged area, which they rely on for visually demanding everyday activities. To investigate the neural plasticity that supports this compensatory strategy, we implemented a simulated scotoma paradigm in healthy participants. Sixty-eight participants were trained on contrast sensitivity and contour integration tasks, at peripheral locations (7.5o from the center) either to the left or right of an artificial scotoma. Peripheral training location – either right or left – was assigned to each participant before training. We collected a total of six runs of task-based fMRI data in each pre- and post-training MRI session. We used a General Linear Model to examine average BOLD activity during task performance for both pre and post MRI sessions. We identified locations in early visual areas where the stimulus drove a positive BOLD response. Moreover, we extracted cortical thickness for these regions. We observed that the stimulus-driven BOLD signal was increased in V1 following visual training. On the contrary, that signal decreased in V2. Our results indicate that experience influences stimulus-driven activity in V1 and V2 in different ways.