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Updated: Jun 22, 2026

Using Eye-tracking to Assess the Relative Importance of Visual and Vestibular Input to Subcortical Motion Processing in the Roll Plane
Published on: August 22, 2025
Eye eccentricity modifies the perception of whole-body rotation
Gaelle Quarck1, Lena Lhuisset, Olivier Etard
1INSERM ERI 27, Univ Caen, Caen, France. gaelle.quarck@unicaen.fr
Abstract:
In order to explore the effect of gaze orientation on whole-body rotation perception, ten healthy participants were rotated in the dark while fixating on a visual target located either straight ahead or 15 degrees to the right. A vestibular-memory contingent saccade paradigm was used to estimate the rotation perception. The results attest to the participants' ability to accurately perceive their rotation, based solely on the intrinsic inputs (somesthetic and mainly vestibular), since the correlation between the imposed body rotation and the saccade amplitude was significant and positive. However, the rotation perception was less accurate and of lesser magnitude when the gaze was deviated in the opposite direction to the rotation than when it was either straight ahead or deviated in the direction of the rotation. This can be interpreted as the perceptual equivalent of Alexander's law.
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