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Published on: December 14, 2011
Changes in trunk orientation do not induce asymmetries in covert orienting
David A Westwood1, Stephanie A H Jones, Christopher D Cowper-Smith
1School of Health and Human Performance, Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, B3H 3J5, Canada, david.westwood@dal.ca.
Attention, Perception & Psychophysics
|May 14, 2013
Summary
Trunk orientation does not affect visual orienting responses. Body rotation relative to the head did not influence how quickly or accurately participants responded to visual targets in these experiments.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive psychology
- Neuroscience
- Human motor control
Background:
- Previous research suggested a "disengage deficit" in covert orienting, potentially linked to trunk orientation changes in healthy individuals.
- Covert orienting involves shifting attention without moving the eyes, a fundamental aspect of visual perception and attention.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of trunk orientation on visual target responses.
- To determine if body rotation relative to the head impacts spatial-cuing effects in visual attention tasks.
Main Methods:
- Five experiments were conducted involving visual target detection and location-based motor responses.
- Participants responded to target color or location following peripheral visual cues, with varying trunk orientations.
Main Results:
- No significant interaction was found between trunk orientation and spatial-cuing effects across all experiments.
- Visual orienting behavior remained consistent regardless of the body's rotation relative to the head.
Conclusions:
- Trunk orientation does not appear to modulate visual orienting responses.
- These findings challenge previous hypotheses regarding the role of body posture in covert attention shifts.
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