Vestibular perception of passive whole-body rotation about horizontal and vertical axes in humans: goal-directed vestibulo-ocular reflex and vestibular memory-contingent saccades.
This study was aimed at complementing the existing knowledge about vestibular perception of self-motion in humans. Both goal-directed vestibulo-ocular reflex and vestibular memory-contingent saccade (VMCS) tasks were used, respectively as concurrent and retrospective magnitude estimators for passive whole-body rotation. Rotations were applied about the earth-vertical and earth-horizontal axes to study the effect of the otolith signal in self-rotation evaluation, and both in yaw and pitch to examine the horizontal and vertical semi-circular canals. Two different magnitudes of constant angular acceleration (50 degrees/s2 and 100 degrees/s2) were used. The main findings were (1) strong correlation between both oculomotor responses of both tasks, (2) greater accuracy with rotations about the earth-vertical than the earth: -horizontal axis, (3) greater accuracy for yaw than for pitch rotations, (4) greater accuracy for high acceleration than for low, and (5) no effect of the delay (2 s or 12 s) in the VMCS task. Adequacy of both tasks as subjective magnitude estimators of vestibular perception of self-motion is discussed.
Israël
I
I
Tübingen University, Neurology Department, Germany.
Fetter
M
M
Koenig
E
E
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006257:Head; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008568:Memory; D009068:Movement; D012027:Reflex, Vestibulo-Ocular; D012399:Rotation; D012438:Saccades; D013997:Time Factors; D014722:Vestibule, Labyrinth / Q000502:physiology*