Subjective motion and acceleration induced by the movement of the observer’s entire visual field

The effect of visual-vestibular conflict on the latency of steady-state visually induced subjective rotation

“…When the standard was presented, the exposure of the subject to the moving drum was too short to produce subjective rotation. Thus, the standard speed, represented by the number 10, should have been close to the physical speed of the drum (see Wong & Frost, 1978).…”

“…Subjective rotation was induced, as reported earlier (Wong & Frost, 1978), by rotating a tall striped drum around an observer sitting in line with the axis of rotation. Visual-vestibular conflict that could have been occurring at the initiation of optokinetic stimulation was reduced by providing the observer with corroborating vestibular stimulation.…”

“…Psychophysical studies of this effect (circularvection) show that observers, when exposed to the rotating drum, experience an initial period of apparent subjective acceleration together with the apparent deceleration of the rotating drum. This is followed by subjective rotation at a steady velocity which closely matches that of the rotating drum (Brandt, Dichgans, & Koening, 1973;Wong & Frost, 1978). Stimulation of the peripheral retinal areas produces a much stronger sensation of apparent movement than does stimulation of an equivalent area of central retina (Brandt et al, 1973 A recent study (Wong & Frost, 1978) investigated, qualitatively and quantitatively, the developmental time course of subjective rotation at a constant velocity.…”

“…When being artificially propelled, the observer immediately feels body movement in a rigid, stable environment. It was hypothesized (Wong & Frost, 1978) that the long latency to constant-velocity subjective rotation could be due to the simultaneous presence of conflicting visual and vestibular inputs. During the initial exposure to an optokinetic stimulus moving at a constant velocity, the visual input would indicate subjective motion at a constant velocity whereas the vestibular input would indicate the absence of body movement.…”

Energy, information, detection, and action

“…As a matter of empirical practice, experimenters rarely define for the experimental subject the frame of reference to be used in making judgments about motion (e.g., Brandt et al 1973;Ohmi et al 1987;Wong & Frost 1978). For example, in Wertheim (1981, p. 102), subjects were asked to rotate a potentiometer to indicate that they perceived a stimulus to be moving or stationary, but there is no indication that subjects were given any instructions as to the referents for these judgments (i.e., moving and stationary relative to what?…”