Meeting Abstract

97.7  Monday, Jan. 6 15:00  Dynamic adaptation of exploratory movements for texture perception DAVIS-BERG, E.C.*; SACHAR, C.; CALLIER, T.; SAAL, H.P.; BENSMAIA, S.J.; Columbia College Chicago; University of Chicago; University of Chicago; University of Chicago; University of Chicago edavisberg@colum.edu

When we explore a textured surface, vibrations are produced in the fingertip skin that carry information about its texture and excite frequency-sensitive mechanoreceptors. Texture-elicited vibrations – and the response these evoked in receptors – depend systematically on the speed with which a finger scans the surface. To understand the neural basis of texture perception, it is therefore important to understand the exploratory movements used to acquire information about texture and how these depend on task demands as well as texture properties. To this end, we had human subjects explore 15 different natural textures, consisting of everyday materials such as fabrics and sandpapers; subjects rated each texture along one of three dominant textural dimensions, namely roughness, stickiness, and hardness. Subjects’ finger movements were recorded with a high-speed camera as they performed the tasks and two-dimensional finger trajectories were extracted using an automated tracking system. We found that scanning speed depended on the task, that is, on the textural dimensions along which subjects provided ratings. Moreover, scanning speed systematically depended on which texture was scanned and varied up to two-fold across textures. These results suggest that scanning speed is rapidly optimized within individual exploratory movements to extract task-relevant features.