Where Is the Action in Perception? An Exploratory Study With a Haptic Sensory Substitution Device

Area of Science:

• Cognitive Science
• Ecological Psychology
• Perception Research

Background:

• Enactive cognitive science (ECS) and ecological psychology (EP) highlight the importance of active movement in perception.
• A key debate concerns whether bodily movements play an instrumental or constitutive role in perception, termed instrumental and constitutive agency, respectively.
• Existing research presents confounds, hindering experimental distinction between these agency hypotheses.

Purpose of the Study:

• To experimentally distinguish between instrumental and constitutive agency in perception.
• To propose and pilot a novel double-participant setup isolating agency as the key variable.
• To investigate the role of agency in perception using a haptic sensory substitution device.

Main Methods:

• Developed a novel double-participant setup to differentiate active and passive perception conditions.
• Conducted a psychological study on width discrimination using the Enactive Torch, a haptic sensory substitution device.
• Collected data to compare perceptual performance under active versus passive movement scenarios.

Main Results:

• No evidence was found to support the stronger hypothesis of constitutive agency over instrumental agency.
• Participants' reported use of cognitive strategies, not spatial perception, during debriefing suggests potential confounds.
• The study's methodology shows promise but requires refinement to ensure focus on embodied experience.

Conclusions:

• The proposed experimental setup is a viable direction for future research on agency in perception.
• Further research needs to carefully control for cognitive strategies to isolate the effects of embodied agency.
• Distinguishing between instrumental and constitutive agency requires robust methods ensuring genuine first-person experience.