Looking away from a moving target does not disrupt the way in which the movement toward the target is guided

Abstract

People usually follow a moving object with their gaze if they intend to interact with it. What would happen if they did not? We recorded eye and finger movements while participants moved a cursor toward a moving target. An unpredictable delay in updating the position of the cursor on the basis of that of the invisible finger made it essential to use visual information to guide the finger's ongoing movement. Decreasing the contrast between the cursor and the background from trial to trial made it difficult to see the cursor without looking at it. In separate experiments, either participants were free to hit the target anywhere along its trajectory or they had to move along a specified path. In the two experiments, participants tracked the cursor rather than the target with their gaze on 13% and 32% of the trials, respectively. They hit fewer targets when the contrast was low or a path was imposed. Not looking at the target did not disrupt the visual guidance that was required to deal with the delays that we imposed. Our results suggest that peripheral vision can be used to guide one item to another, irrespective of which item one is looking at.

Functional Use of Eye Movements for an Acting System

“…Whereas eye movements are beneficial, they might not always be necessary for accurate interception. For example, when observers were asked to collide their unseen finger (represented by a cursor) with a moving target, they were able to guide interception timing using either foveal or peripheral vision, although large individual differences were noted in this study [30]. Whether accurate eye movements are necessary or merely beneficial might depend on exact task requirements and stimulus environments.…”

Pursuing a target with one's eyes helps judge its velocity

“…If people want to intercept a target, they are reluctant not to follow it with their eyes (Cámara et al, 2020). This is understandable because they can intercept a target that they are following with their eyes slightly more precisely (Brenner and Smeets, 2011).…”

Micropursuit and the control of attention and eye movements in dynamic environments

“… Diaz, Cooper, Rothkopf, and Hayhoe (2013) suggested that such pursuit might generate extraretinal signals that help predict the future location of the ball. Other studies inferred a useful role for both retinal and extraretinal aspects of pursuit of the target or cursor in tasks that required manual interception of a moving object ( Camara, Lopez-Moliner, Brenner, & de la Malla, 2020 ; Cesqui, Mezzetti, Lacquaniti, & d'Avella, 2015 ; Danion & Flanagan, 2018 ; Fooken, Yeo, Pai & Spering, 2016 ).…”