Anchoring in Rhythmic In-Phase and Antiphase Visuomotor Tracking

Abstract

Rhythmic limb movements are often anchored at particular points in the movement cycle. Anchoring may reveal essential task-specific information for motor control. We examined the effect of tracking mode (in-phase, antiphase) and gaze direction (left, right) on anchoring in visuomotor tracking with and without concurrent visual feedback of the hand movement. For in-phase tracking, anchoring was observed at the foveated reversal point whereas for antiphase tracking anchoring was observed at both reversals, suggesting the presence of two reference points instead of one. Anchoring at the foveated reversal reflected gaze anchoring (i.e., coalignment of hand and gaze) while anchoring at the nonfoveated reversal reflected visuomotor synchronization (i.e., the hand was steered to the nonfoveated reversal coincident with a target reversal at the point of gaze). We propose that the number and location of anchor points play a crucial role in the underlying control by providing reference values for error correction processes.