Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.

The link between perception and action allows us to interact fluently with the world. Objects which 'afford' an action elicit a visuomotor response, facilitating compatible responses. In addition, positioning objects to interact with one another appears to facilitate grouping, indicated by...

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Main Authors: Roberts, K, Humphreys, G
Format: Journal article
Language:English
Published: 2011
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author Roberts, K
Humphreys, G
author_facet Roberts, K
Humphreys, G
author_sort Roberts, K
collection OXFORD
description The link between perception and action allows us to interact fluently with the world. Objects which 'afford' an action elicit a visuomotor response, facilitating compatible responses. In addition, positioning objects to interact with one another appears to facilitate grouping, indicated by patients with extinction being better able to identify interacting objects (e.g. a corkscrew going towards the top of a wine bottle) than the same objects when positioned incorrectly for action (Riddoch, Humphreys, Edwards, Baker, and Willson, Nature Neuroscience, 6, 82-89, 2003). Here, we investigate the effect of action relations on the perception of normal participants. We found improved identification of briefly-presented objects when in correct versus incorrect co-locations for action. For the object that would be 'active' in the interaction (the corkscrew), this improvement was enhanced when it was oriented for use by the viewer's dominant hand. In contrast, the position-related benefit for the 'passive' object was stronger when the objects formed an action-related pair (corkscrew and bottle) compared with an unrelated pair (corkscrew and candle), and it was reduced when spatial cues disrupted grouping between the objects. We propose that these results indicate two separate effects of action relations on normal perception: a visuomotor response to objects which strongly afford an action; and a grouping effect between objects which form action-related pairs.
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spelling oxford-uuid:3af6fcff-898c-47af-8d15-72b79b170ad22022-03-26T14:04:49ZAction relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.Journal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:3af6fcff-898c-47af-8d15-72b79b170ad2EnglishSymplectic Elements at Oxford2011Roberts, KHumphreys, GThe link between perception and action allows us to interact fluently with the world. Objects which 'afford' an action elicit a visuomotor response, facilitating compatible responses. In addition, positioning objects to interact with one another appears to facilitate grouping, indicated by patients with extinction being better able to identify interacting objects (e.g. a corkscrew going towards the top of a wine bottle) than the same objects when positioned incorrectly for action (Riddoch, Humphreys, Edwards, Baker, and Willson, Nature Neuroscience, 6, 82-89, 2003). Here, we investigate the effect of action relations on the perception of normal participants. We found improved identification of briefly-presented objects when in correct versus incorrect co-locations for action. For the object that would be 'active' in the interaction (the corkscrew), this improvement was enhanced when it was oriented for use by the viewer's dominant hand. In contrast, the position-related benefit for the 'passive' object was stronger when the objects formed an action-related pair (corkscrew and bottle) compared with an unrelated pair (corkscrew and candle), and it was reduced when spatial cues disrupted grouping between the objects. We propose that these results indicate two separate effects of action relations on normal perception: a visuomotor response to objects which strongly afford an action; and a grouping effect between objects which form action-related pairs.
spellingShingle Roberts, K
Humphreys, G
Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title_full Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title_fullStr Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title_full_unstemmed Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title_short Action relations facilitate the identification of briefly-presented objects.
title_sort action relations facilitate the identification of briefly presented objects
work_keys_str_mv AT robertsk actionrelationsfacilitatetheidentificationofbrieflypresentedobjects
AT humphreysg actionrelationsfacilitatetheidentificationofbrieflypresentedobjects