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The goal of the present investigation was to explore the putative contributions of feedforward- and feedback-based processes in the control of memory-guided reaching movements. Participants (N = 4) completed an extensive number of reaching movements (2700) to 3 midline targets (20, 30, 40 cm) in 6 visual conditions: full-vision, open-loop, and four memory-guided conditions (0, 200, 400, and 600 ms of delay). To infer limb control, we used a regression technique to examine the within-trial correspondence between the spatial position of the limb at peak acceleration, peak velocity, peak deceleration, and the ultimate movement endpoint. A high degree of within-trial correspondence would suggest that the final position of the limb was largely specified prior to movement onset and not adjusted during the action (i.e., feedforward control); conversely, a low degree of within-trial correspondence would suggest that movements were modified during the reaching trajectory (i.e., feedback control). Full-vision reaches were found to be more accurate and less variable than open-loop and memory-guided reaches. Moreover, full-vision reaches demonstrated only modest within-trial correspondence between the spatial position of the limb at each kinematic marker and the ultimate movement endpoint, suggesting that reaching accuracy was achieved by adjusting the limb trajectory throughout the course of the action. Open-loop and memory-guided movements exhibited strong within-trial correspondence between final limb position and the position of the limb at peak velocity and peak deceleration. This strong correspondence indicates that the final position of the limb was largely determined by processes that occurred before the reach was initiated; errors in the planning process were not corrected during the course of the action. Thus, and contrary to our previous findings in a video-based aiming task, it appears that stored target information is not extensively (if at all) used to modify the trajectory of reaching movements to remembered targets in peripersonal space.

This investigation tested the proposal that a "highly accurate" and temporally unstable stored target representation is available to the motor system for the online control of memory-guided reaches. Participants reached to a target that was: (a) visible during the response, (b) extinguished at movement onset, and (c) occluded for 0, 500, 1,500 and 2,500 ms in advance of response cueing. Additionally, trials were performed with (i.e., limb visible) and without (i.e., limb occluded) vision of the reaching limb. Results showed that limb occluded trials undershot the target location in each target condition, and were characterized by a primarily offline mode of control. In contrast, limb visible trials showed a consistent level of endpoint accuracy for each target condition and elicited more online reaching corrections than limb occluded trials. It is therefore proposed that a reasonably accurate and temporally stable stored target representation can be combined with vision of the moving limb for the online control of memory-guided reaches.

It has been proposed that movements to visible and remembered targets are sensitive to qualitatively different types of visual information. When the target is continuously visible, prehensile movements are thought to reflect veridical object size, whereas memory-dependent prehension is sensitive to the perceived size of the object. This hypothesis was explored by assessing the influence of illusory target width on prehension kinematics in three visual conditions: closed-loop (CL; full vision during the response), open-loop brief-delay (OL; visual occlusion coincident with the movement initiation cue) and open-loop 3-s delay (OL3; visual occlusion 3 s prior to movement initiation). To modulate illusory target width, objects were placed on backgrounds consisting of three forms of the Müller-Lyer (ML) figure. Peak grip aperture was sensitive to the ML figure in the OL and OL3, but not CL conditions, suggesting that perceptual information is used to modulate this grasping parameter when the movement is programmed and executed on the basis of visual memory. Peak-aperture velocity was affected by the ML illusion in all three visual conditions, suggesting that perceived object size might be important for modulating this aspect of prehension, independent of memory requirements. The different sensitivity of grip aperture and aperture velocity to illusory target width in the CL condition suggests that grasp preshaping might reflect multiple visuomotor processes. The results of this study are consistent with the tenets of the two-stream model of visual processing.

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After lesions to primary visual cortex, patients lack conscious awareness of visual stimuli. Interestingly, however, some retain the ability to make accurate judgments about the visual world (i.e., so-called blindsight). Similarly, damage to inferior occipitotemporal regions of cortex (e.g., lateral occipital cortex) can result in an inability to perceive object properties while retaining the ability to act on them (i.e., visual form agnosia). In the present work, we demonstrate that the ability to interact with objects in the absence of conscious awareness is not isolated to those with restricted neuropathologic conditions. Specifically, neurologically intact individuals are able to program and execute goal-directed reaching movements to a target object without awareness of extrinsic target properties; they accurately tune the dynamics of their movement and modulate it online without conscious access to features of the goal object. Thus, the planning and execution of actions are not dependent on conscious awareness of the environment, suggesting that the phenomenon of blindsight (and agnosia) reflect normal conditions of the visual system. action ͉ agnosia ͉ blindsight ͉ consciousness ͉ perception

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