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Abstract:
The set of physically incoherent combinations of visual and inertial motions that are nonetheless judged coherent by human observers is referred to as the 'Coherence Zone' (CZ). Here we propose that Causal Inference (CI) models of self-motion perception may offer a more comprehensive alternative to the CZ. CI models include an assessment of the probability of competing causal structures. This probability may be interpreted as a CZ.
In an experiment nine participants were presented with horizontal linear visual-only, inertial-only, and combined visual-inertial motion stimuli with heading discrepancies up to 90°, and asked to provide heading estimates. Model predictions were compared to obtained data to assess model tenability.
The CI model accounted well for the data of one participant; for five others the results imply that discrepancies do not affect heading perception. Results for the remaining participants were inconclusive.
We conclude that CI models can offer a more comprehensive interpretation of the CZ, but that more research is needed to identify when discrepancies are detected. The methodology proposed here may be adapted to account for characteristics of self-motion other than heading, such as amplitude and phase.
