Limits of the Classical Functionalist Perspective on Sensory Substitution

Ptito, Maurice; Iversen, Katrine; Auvray, Malika; Deroy, Ophelia; Ron, Kupers

doi:10.5871/bacad/9780197266441.003.0008

Cited by 5 publications

(4 citation statements)

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“…Thus, the LOC likely processes more abstract object-form information regardless of the sensory modality of the input. This result suggests that the observed crossmodal recruitment of the visual cortex by sensory substitution devices could be due to the unravelling of preexisting computations through nonvisual inputs, present prior to using the SSD (e.g., Ptito et al, 2005;Striem-Amit et al, 2012; see also Ptito et al 2018, for a review). Beyond the LOC, typically nonauditory areas such as the left precentral sulcus and the right occipital-parietal sulcus also show differential activity following sensory substitution training (Striem-Amit et al, 2011).…”

Section: Key Results From Neuroimaging and Deprivation Studiesmentioning

confidence: 94%

“…The mechanisms underlying this remarkable transformation of information from one sensory modality to another has been subject to much debate (Bach-y-Rita and Kercel, 2003;Keeley, 2002;Ptito et al, 2018). Several theories and models attempt to explain how the brain is able to exploit intact sensory modalities to perceive information that is normally conveyed through another modality.…”

Section: Dominance Deference and Multisensory Views Of Sensory Substitutionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Mixing up the Senses: Sensory Substitution Is Not a Form of Artificially Induced Synaesthesia

2020

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Abstract Sensory Substitution Devices (SSDs) are typically used to restore functionality of a sensory modality that has been lost, like vision for the blind, by recruiting another sensory modality such as touch or audition. Sensory substitution has given rise to many debates in psychology, neuroscience and philosophy regarding the nature of experience when using SSDs. Questions first arose as to whether the experience of sensory substitution is represented by the substituted information, the substituting information, or a multisensory combination of the two. More recently, parallels have been drawn between sensory substitution and synaesthesia, a rare condition in which individuals involuntarily experience a percept in one sensory or cognitive pathway when another one is stimulated. Here, we explore the efficacy of understanding sensory substitution as a form of ‘artificial synaesthesia’. We identify several problems with previous suggestions for a link between these two phenomena. Furthermore, we find that sensory substitution does not fulfil the essential criteria that characterise synaesthesia. We conclude that sensory substitution and synaesthesia are independent of each other and thus, the ‘artificial synaesthesia’ view of sensory substitution should be rejected.

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Section: Key Results From Neuroimaging and Deprivation Studiesmentioning

confidence: 94%

Section: Dominance Deference and Multisensory Views Of Sensory Substitutionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mixing up the Senses: Sensory Substitution Is Not a Form of Artificially Induced Synaesthesia

2020

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“…However, the degree to which the use of a sensory substitution device involves visual processes varies from one person to another (Arnold et al, 2017). In parallel, brain-imaging studies have shown that the use and practice of visual-to-tactile (Ptito et al, 2005) and visual-to-auditory (e.g., Striem-Amit and Amedi, 2014) devices result in increased activation in blind people's visual cortex (for reviews, see Proulx et al, 2014;Ptito et al, 2018).…”

Section: Sensory Substitutionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ears on the Hand: Reaching Three-Dimensional Targets With an Audio-Motor Device

Hanneton¹,

Hoellinger

Forma

et al. 2020

Multisens. Res.

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Understanding the processes underlying sensorimotor coupling with the environment is crucial for sensorimotor rehabilitation and sensory substitution. In doing so, devices which provide novel sensory feedback consequent to body movement may be optimized in order to enhance motor performance for particular tasks. The aim of the study reported here was to investigate audio-motor coupling when the auditory experience is linked to movements of the head or the hands. The participants had to localize and reach a virtual source with the dominant hand in response to sounds. An electromagnetic system recorded the position and orientation of the participants’ head and hands. This system was connected to a 3D audio system that provided binaural auditory feedback on the position of the virtual listener located on the participants’ body. The listener’s position was computed either from the hands or from the head. For the hand condition, the virtual listener was placed on the dominant hand (the one used to reach the target) in Experiment 1 and on the non-dominant hand, which was constrained in order to have similar amplitude and degrees of freedom as that of the head, in Experiment 2. The results revealed that, in the two experiments, the participants were able to localize a source within the 3D auditory environment. Performance varied as a function of the effector’s degrees of freedom and the spatial coincidence between sensor and effector. The results also allowed characterizing the kinematics of the hand and head and how they change with audio-motor coupling condition and practice.

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“…One study directly compared activation longitudinally 20 and did not reveal increased activation, but a change in functional connectivity. This result suggests that the observed cross-modal recruitment of the visual cortex during the use of sensory substitution devices can be due to unmasking of existing computations through non-visual inputs already there prior to devices’ use 13 , 21 , 22 (see 23 for a review).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Training-induced plasticity enables visualizing sounds with a visual-to-auditory conversion device

Lerousseau

Arnold²,

Auvray

2021

Sci Rep

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Sensory substitution devices aim at restoring visual functions by converting visual information into auditory or tactile stimuli. Although these devices show promise in the range of behavioral abilities they allow, the processes underlying their use remain underspecified. In particular, while an initial debate focused on the visual versus auditory or tactile nature of sensory substitution, since over a decade, the idea that it reflects a mixture of both has emerged. In order to investigate behaviorally the extent to which visual and auditory processes are involved, participants completed a Stroop-like crossmodal interference paradigm before and after being trained with a conversion device which translates visual images into sounds. In addition, participants' auditory abilities and their phenomenologies were measured. Our study revealed that, after training, when asked to identify sounds, processes shared with vision were involved, as participants’ performance in sound identification was influenced by the simultaneously presented visual distractors. In addition, participants’ performance during training and their associated phenomenology depended on their auditory abilities, revealing that processing finds its roots in the input sensory modality. Our results pave the way for improving the design and learning of these devices by taking into account inter-individual differences in auditory and visual perceptual strategies.

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Limits of the Classical Functionalist Perspective on Sensory Substitution

Cited by 5 publications

References 0 publications

Mixing up the Senses: Sensory Substitution Is Not a Form of Artificially Induced Synaesthesia

Mixing up the Senses: Sensory Substitution Is Not a Form of Artificially Induced Synaesthesia

Ears on the Hand: Reaching Three-Dimensional Targets With an Audio-Motor Device

Training-induced plasticity enables visualizing sounds with a visual-to-auditory conversion device

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