Serial dependency generalization for distinct objects and actions during interception tasks

• Grant number: 22/16566-2
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: April 01, 2023
• End date: March 31, 2024
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Psychology - Cognitive Psychology
• Principal Investigator: André Mascioli Cravo
• Grantee: Veronica Casagrande
• Host Institution: Centro de Matemática, Computação e Cognição (CMCC). Universidade Federal do ABC (UFABC). Ministério da Educação (Brasil). Santo André , SP, Brazil

Abstract

Visual stimuli on the current trial are biased towards the content of similar visual stimuli on the previous trial. This effect named serial dependency appears in memory tasks for a variety of visual stimuli and also in interception tasks with moving objects. The existence of serial dependency is frequently justified by the spatio-temporal regularities and stabilities in the position and appearance of objects. Therefore, it would be efficient for the brain to take advantage of these regularities to save on cognitive resources during processing. A consequence of this proposal would be that objects with distinct contexts have distinct dynamics of serial biases. The context of memorized objects tends to enhance the magnitude of serial dependency between similar objects when these characteristics are relevant for the task execution. However, this has not been shown until now for tasks that do not require the explicit memorization of content. Beyond the expansion of the literature findings, to show the usage of distinct biases for distinct objects in interception tasks will allow us to expand the knowledge in the field regarding the functional role of serial dependency for the stability of visual processing during the visuomotor integration with different effectors. In this project, we will verify if participants can store two distinct sets of serial biases during an interception task susceptible to serial dependency. To this end we will employ objects with different contexts (color and movement direction) for which participants must respond with different effectors (right and left hand).