Document Detail


Causality attribution biases oculomotor responses.
MedLine Citation:
PMID:  20685994     Owner:  NLM     Status:  MEDLINE    
Abstract/OtherAbstract:
When viewing one object move after being struck by another, humans perceive that the action of the first object "caused" the motion of the second, not that the two events occurred independently. Although established as a perceptual and linguistic concept, it is not yet known whether the notion of causality exists as a fundamental, preattentional "Gestalt" that can influence predictive motor processes. Therefore, eye movements of human observers were measured while viewing a display in which a launcher impacted a tool to trigger the motion of a second "reaction" target. The reaction target could move either in the direction predicted by transfer of momentum after the collision ("causal") or in a different direction ("noncausal"), with equal probability. Control trials were also performed with identical target motion, either with a 100 ms time delay between the collision and reactive motion, or without the interposed tool. Subjects made significantly more predictive movements (smooth pursuit and saccades) in the causal direction during standard trials, and smooth pursuit latencies were also shorter overall. These trends were reduced or absent in control trials. In addition, pursuit latencies in the noncausal direction were longer during standard trials than during control trials. The results show that causal context has a strong influence on predictive movements.
Authors:
Jeremy Badler; Philippe Lefèvre; Marcus Missal
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Publication Detail:
Type:  Journal Article; Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't    
Journal Detail:
Title:  The Journal of neuroscience : the official journal of the Society for Neuroscience     Volume:  30     ISSN:  1529-2401     ISO Abbreviation:  J. Neurosci.     Publication Date:  2010 Aug 
Date Detail:
Created Date:  2010-08-05     Completed Date:  2010-08-24     Revised Date:  -    
Medline Journal Info:
Nlm Unique ID:  8102140     Medline TA:  J Neurosci     Country:  United States    
Other Details:
Languages:  eng     Pagination:  10517-25     Citation Subset:  IM    
Affiliation:
Laboratoire de Neurophysiologie, Université Catholique de Louvain, 1200 Brussels, Belgium.
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MeSH Terms
Descriptor/Qualifier:
Adult
Attention / physiology
Eye Movements / physiology*
Female
Humans
Male
Motion Perception / physiology*
Photic Stimulation
Psychomotor Performance / physiology
Reaction Time / physiology

From MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine


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