On the plasticity of visual-proprioceptive bias effects

Recent research has suggested that attentional factors play a role in determining the direction of intermodality adaptation. The present work explored the role of such factors in the visual/proprioceptive dominance, or bias, paradigm. In a preliminary experiment, an instructional approach was used and proved totally ineffective in shifting dominance. In Experiments 1 and 2, an active pointing approach was used, in which the subject was caused to concentrate on one modality or the other by having him localize a large number of unconflicted targets in that modality. This approach was successful in changing the normal dominance relation. Such an altered dominance relation may indeed be a necessary part of the shifting of normal adaptation patterns.