Perception and action 2

Question 1

What are the three ways we stay on course?

Answer 1

Optic flow
Visual direction strategy
Spatial updating

Question 2

What is visual direction strategy? (simple)

Answer 2

orientating towards goals and away from obstancles

Question 3

What is spatial updating? (simple)

Answer 3

updating of self-position and target location using motor control and proprioception

Question 4

Describe the visual direction strategy study

Answer 4

studied walking towards goals and around obstacles using VR

They also looked at route selection

Question 5

What did the study on visual direction strategy find?

Answer 5

Participants turn body toward a goal
Participants turn body away from an obstacle
Errors are corrected by reorienting towards target

Question 6

What do the findings of the visual direction strategy study suggest?

Answer 6

human route selection does not require explicit planning but may emerge online as a consequence of elementary behaviours for steering and obstacle avoidance

Dynamic interaction between perception and action

Question 7

Describe the study on spatial updating

Answer 7

Participants viewed a target, closed their eyes, then tried to walk to target along one of three paths
Blind walking experiment

Question 8

How did the participants do in the spatial updating study?

Answer 8

did pretty good but worse for farther targets

Question 9

What did the study on spatial updating find?

Answer 9

We can navigate without immediate visual input
In blind walking, participants depend on:
Initial visually perceived location of target
Response execution
Updating of self-position
Imaginal updating of target location

There is an interaction between motor control and proprioception –> still perception and action interaction

Question 10

What are some general ways we navigate? Rate them by experience

Answer 10

Initially we depend on a sequence of street names
Then we use a sequence of imagined landmarks
Once it is part of your routine you use first-person imagery of you travelling the route

Question 11

What are two ways we navigate?

Answer 11

Landmarks
Cognitive maps

Question 12

Describe the study on landmarks? What were the conditions?

Answer 12

Participants navigated virtual maze full of landmarks
First train (explore), then test (navigate)

Either navigate with all of the landmarks of half of the landmarks
Could be least fixated half or most fixated half of landmarks

Question 13

When the study on landmarks looked at fixation time during training, which landmarks did people fixate on for the longest?

Answer 13

landmarks at decision points

Question 14

What were the results of the study on landmarks?

Answer 14

Navigation depended on perception and memory of decision-point landmarks

If they removed the least fixated landmarks it didn’t make any difference

If they removed the most fixated landmarks, it had a significant impact

Question 15

What did the study on cognitive maps do?

Answer 15

Recording of medial temporal lobe cells while rat navigated

Question 16

What are medial temporal lobe cells for?

Answer 16

Important for where we are in the world

Question 17

When did firing increase for the rat in the cognitive map study?

Answer 17

when the rat enters the place cell’s optimal zone

Question 18

What were the four types of medial temporal lobe cells they found in the cognitive maps study?

Answer 18

Place cells
Grid cells
Head direction cell
Border cell

Question 19

What are place cells? What would happen if you put animal in a new place?

Answer 19

Place cells fire when an animal is in a particular location

Would develop a new place area in a new environment

Question 20

What is a grid cell? What are they used for?

Answer 20

Grid cells fire on a regular lattice in the environment
Used to keep track of how we are moving through the environment

Question 21

What are border cells?

Answer 21

Border cells respond to a boundary at a particular distance and direction from animal

Question 22

What are head-direction cells?

Answer 22

Respond when animal faces a certain direction irrespective of location

Question 23

How does the navigation system in the medial temporal lobe allow an animal to keep track of where they are in the environment? What information is being used (5)?

Answer 23

Uses the four types of cells and information from visual input, somatosensory input, proprioceptive input, motor commands, and memory

Question 24

What are the three ways we interact with objects?

Answer 24

Perceiving actions an object affords (affordances)
Representing those actions (PRR)
Transforming visual input into coordinates for guiding action

Question 25

What are affordances? Give examples

Answer 25

Potential actions that an object offers to an organism Perceivable along with physical features Button- push Switch - flip Knob - rotate

Question 26

Describe the study on affordances? What was the research question?

Answer 26

Do perceived objects prime affordances (activate affordances)? Primed with an object on the screen (beer mug, teapot, frying pan) Shown a horizontal or vertical handcue for grasping object Got the person to perform a hand action to grad two targets

Question 27

What were the two object primes and hand cue options for the study on affordances?

Answer 27

Cup could be a normal orientation or it could have a rotated orientation Hand cue could be congruent of incongruent with the orientation of the cup

Question 28

What were the results of the study on affordances?

Answer 28

Participants actions (reach out and grab) were faster when perceived object primed congruent action than incongruent action They were faster overall for the normal object rotation

Question 29

What did the study on affordances discover?

Answer 29

Pictures of handled objects such as a beer mug or frying pan are shown to prime speeded reach and grasp actions that are compatible with the object Just sight of objects activates representation of grasp for object

Question 30

What pathway is the parietal reach region found?

Answer 30

Dorsal where

Question 31

Describe the study on the parietal reach region

Answer 31

Single unit recording in monkey PRR Monkey looks at fixation light in the dark --> light on and sees object --> lights out and can't see object --> reaches in dark then grasps object Shown different objects requiring different grasps

Question 32

What did the study on the parietal reach region find?

Answer 32

Different neurons appear to encode different grasps

Question 33

Describe the order that we transform visual inputs into coordinates for guiding action?

Answer 33

Visual target -- eye centered coordinates -- head centered coordinates --- body-centered coordinates --- arm-centered coordinates -- joint coordinates --- movement

Question 34

What is another way we perceive action?

Answer 34

Mirror neurons

Question 35

What do mirror neurons respond to?

Answer 35

Both to performance of an action and perception of that action

Question 36

What did this study on mirror neurons find?

Answer 36

Fires when watching a person pick up a peanut Fires lots when it picks up a peanut itself Doesn't fire much when tool picks up peanut

Question 37

What did the study on mirror neurons and monkeys find? What were the four conditions?

Answer 37

Response was not specific to any modality Mirror neurons responding to peanut breaking: View and sound View only Sound only Motor action ( animal opens nut)

Question 38

What did the study on mirror neurons in humans find (general)?

Answer 38

Mirror neurons responded to observing actions and executing the actions themselves

Question 39

What were the four areas tested in the study of mirror neurons in humans?

Answer 39

Left entorhinal cortex, right parahippocampal gyrus, left SMA, left parahippocampal gyrus

Question 40

What were the two conditions they tested on the left enthorinal cortex for the mirror neurons in humans study? What did they find?

Answer 40

Frown and smile Showed activation for both doing it and observing someone doing it

Question 41

What were the two conditions they tested on the right parahippocampal gyrus for the mirror neurons in humans study? What did they find?

Answer 41

whole hand grip movements and precision hand grip movements Showed activation for both observing and executing the movement

Question 42

What was the condition they tested on the left SMA for the mirror neurons in humans study? What did they find?

Answer 42

Smile showed depression in firing for observing and executing the smile

Question 43

What was the condition they tested on the left parahippocampal gyrus for the mirror neurons in humans study? What did they find?

Answer 43

Frown Fires less for observing it and more for executing it

Question 44

Where are mirror neurons found?

Answer 44

In many parts of the brain

Question 45

Are mirror neurons just for perception and motor pairing?

Answer 45

No they can be for emotions too

Question 46

How long does a hitter have to decide whether to hit a major league fastball?

Answer 46

100-150 ms

Question 47

Do baseball players have enough time to think and hit?

Answer 47

No

Question 48

How do baseball players hit the ball if they don't have enough time to think and hit?

Answer 48

predict the trajectory in advance and anticipate what will happen

Question 49

Do baseball players have enough time to separate perception and action?

Answer 49

No, they do both at the same time

Question 50

How often do baseball players make a hit?

Answer 50

1/4 of the time they get a hit

Question 51

Are pitchers getting faster overtime? What was the fastest pitch?

Answer 51

Yes, 106 MPH