TRANSFORMATION PROCESS OF THE VISUOMOTOR MEMORY REPRESENTATION OF A TARGET IN FAR SPACE AFTER BODY ROTATION

Abstract

We examined the transformation process of visuomotor memory representation in far space. We conducted two experiments in which participants were asked to memorize target locations and, after a short delay, to point to the memorized target after body rotation to particular angles. The results were that (1) after body rotation, participants pointed to the locations displaced toward the body position before, not after, rotation, and the magnitude of the displacement increased as the rotational angle of the body increased, and (2) that participants reproduced the memorized space for pointing as shrunken after body rotation, and the ratio of reproduction decreased as the rotational angle of the body increased, to approximately 90% and 45% of the original space after 10-deg and 140-deg body rotation, respectively. We concluded that the effect of body rotation on the body-centered spatial representation and the compensative contribution of the environment-centered spatial representation in transforming the spatial memory after body rotation is considerable.