Action binding refers to the observation that the perceived time of an action (e.g., a keypress) is shifted towards the distal sensory feedback (usually a sound) triggered by that action. Surprisingly, the role of somatosensory feedback for this phenomenon has been largely ignored. We fill this gap by showing that the somatosensory feedback, indexed by keypress peak force, is functional in judging keypress time. Specifically, the strength of somatosensory feedback is positively correlated with reported keypress time when the keypress is not associated with an auditory feedback and negatively correlated when the keypress triggers an auditory feedback. The result is consistent with the view that the reported keypress time is shaped by sensory information from different modalities. Moreover, individual differences in action binding can be explained by a sensory information weighting between somatosensory and auditory feedback. At the group level, increasing the strength of somatosensory feedback can decrease action binding to a level not being detected statistically. Therefore, a multisensory information integration account (between somatosensory and auditory inputs) explains action binding at both a group level and an individual level.
Experiments in animal models have shown that running increases neuronal activity in early visual areas in light as well as in darkness. This suggests that visual processing is influenced by locomotion independent of visual input. Combining mobile electroencephalography, motion- and eye-tracking, we investigated the influence of overground free walking on cortical alpha activity (~10 Hz) and eye movements in healthy humans. Alpha activity has been considered a valuable marker of inhibition of sensory processing and shown to negatively correlate with neuronal firing rates. We found that walking led to a decrease in alpha activity over occipital cortex compared to standing. This decrease was present during walking in darkness as well as during light. Importantly, eye movements could not explain the change in alpha activity. Nevertheless, we found that walking and eye related movements were linked. While the blink rate increased with increasing walking speed independent of light or darkness, saccade rate was only significantly linked to walking speed in the light. Pupil size, on the other hand, was larger during darkness than during light, but only showed a modulation by walking in darkness. Analyzing the effect of walking with respect to the stride cycle, we further found that blinks and saccades preferentially occurred during the double support phase of walking. Alpha power, as shown previously, was lower during the swing phase than during the double support phase. We however could exclude the possibility that the alpha modulation was introduced by a walking movement induced change in electrode impedance. Overall, our work indicates that the human visual system is influenced by the current locomotion state of the body. This influence affects eye movement pattern as well as neuronal activity in sensory areas and might form part of an implicit strategy to optimally extract sensory information during locomotion.
Auditory feedback to a keypress is used in many devices to facilitate the motor output. The timing of auditory feedback is known to have an impact on the motor output, yet it is not known if a keypress action can be modulated on-line by an auditory feedback or how quick an auditory feedback can influence an ongoing keypress. Furthermore, it is not clear if the prediction of auditory feedback already changes the early phase of a keypress action independent of sensory feedback, which would suggest that such prediction changes the motor plan. In the current study, participants pressed a touch-sensitive device with auditory feedback in a self-paced manner. The auditory feedback was given either after a short (60 msec) or long (160 msec) delay, and the delay was either predictable or not. Our results showed that the keypress peak force was modulated by the amount of auditory feedback delay even when the delay was unpredictable, thus demonstrating an on-line modulation effect. The latency of the on-line modulation was suggested to be as low as 70 msec, indicating a very fast sensory to motor mapping circuit in the brain. When the auditory feedback delay was predictable, a change in the very early phase of keypress motor output was found, suggesting that the prediction of sensory feedback is crucial to motor control. Therefore, even a simple keypress action contains rich motor dynamics, which depend on expected as well as on-line perceived sensory feedback.
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