Abstract: The detection of causal relations in sensory events is essential for human understanding of the external world. Certain spatiotemporal patterns in object interactions automatically and irresistibly evoke impressions of causality, suggesting that humans do perceive causality in visual events. Building on recent findings, we investigated how visual adaptation to classical Michotte-type launches produces negative aftereffects when observers are asked to detect launches in ambiguous test events. In our studies, we presented various visual adaptors and tested whether adaptation would transfer to test events that differ in specific feature dimensions, with the aim of identifying the elements underlying causal perception. Our results showed that the perception of causality is selective for motion direction and we provide further evidence that perceived causality is primarily influenced by spatiotemporal parameters. Contrary to previous assumptions, we found that the visual system can overcome strict spatial constraints to detect causality even at a distance. Furthermore, we observed strong contextual effects, such as causal capture, that emerge after the adaptation to launches. These findings highlight the importance of adaptation as a method for studying the visual architecture underlying the perception of causality, and emphasize how the interplay of space, time, and context shapes our understanding of cause and effect in dynamic visual environments.

Webex-Link: https://fu-berlin.webex.com/fu-berlin-en/j.php?MTID=m8d04e07e56cace55a5681c51087e8d46