A population coding account for systematic variation in saccadic dead time

During movement programming, there is a point in time at which the movement system is committed to executing an action with certain parameters even though new information may render this action obsolete. For saccades programmed to a visual target this period is termed the dead time. Using a double-step paradigm, we examined potential variability in the dead time with variations in overall saccade latency and spatiotemporal configuration of two sequential targets. In experiment 1, we varied overall saccade latency by manipulating the presence or absence of a central fixation point. Despite a large and robust gap effect, decreasing the saccade latency in this way did not alter the dead time. In experiment 2, we varied the separation between the two targets. The dead time increased with separation up to a point and then leveled off. A stochastic accumulator model of the oculomotor decision mechanism accounts comprehensively for our findings. The model predicts a gap effect through changes in baseline activity without producing variations in the dead time. Variations in dead time with separation between the two target locations are a natural consequence of the population coding assumption in the model.