title: Motor-sensory convergence in object localization: a comparative study in rats and humans.
abstract: In order to identify basic aspects in the process of tactile perception, we trained rats and humans in similar object localization tasks and compared the strategies used by the two species. We found that rats integrated temporally related sensory inputs ('temporal inputs') from early whisk cycles with spatially related inputs ('spatial inputs') to align their whiskers with the objects; their perceptual reports appeared to be based primarily on this spatial alignment. In a similar manner, human subjects also integrated temporal and spatial inputs, but relied mainly on temporal inputs for object localization. These results suggest that during tactile object localization, an iterative motor-sensory process gradually converges on a stable percept of object location in both species.
authors.affiliation: The Department of Neurobiology, The Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel.
authors.forename: Guy
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Horev
authors.forename: Avraham
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Saig
authors.forename: Per Magne
authors.initials: PM
authors.lastname: Knutsen
authors.forename: Maciej
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Pietr
authors.forename: Chunxiu
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Yu
authors.forename: Ehud
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Ahissar
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal / Q000502:physiology; D005106:Exploratory Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011434:Proprioception / Q000502:physiology*; D051381:Rats; D012677:Sensation / Q000502:physiology*; D013028:Space Perception / Q000502:physiology; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D014738:Vibrissae / Q000502:physiology*; D014741:Video Recording