Citation

Abekawa N, Ferrè ER, Gallagher M, Gomi H, Haggard P. Cortex 2018; 104: 46-57.

Affiliation

Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London, London, UK. Electronic address: p.haggard@ucl.ac.uk.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2018, Masson Editeur)

DOI

10.1016/j.cortex.2018.04.003

PMID

29734006

Abstract

The body midline provides a basic reference for egocentric representation of external space. Clinical observations have suggested that vestibular information underpins egocentric representations. Here we aimed to clarify whether and how vestibular inputs contribute to egocentric representation in healthy volunteers. In a psychophysical task, participants were asked to judge whether visual stimuli were located to the left or to the right of their body midline. Artificial vestibular stimulation was applied to stimulate the vestibular organs. We found that artificial stimulation of the vestibular system biased body midline perception. Importantly, no effect was found on motor effector selection. We also ruled out additional explanations based on allocentric visual representations and on potential indirect effects caused by vestibular-driven movements of the eyes, head and body. Taken together our data suggest that vestibular information contributes to computation of egocentric representations by affecting the internal representation of the body midline.

Copyright © 2018. Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Language: en

Keywords

Egocentric representation; Multisensory integration; Vestibular system