Investigating visuo-tactile recognition of unfamiliar moving objects

Abstract

Previous research on haptic object recognition has focused mainly on static objects and very little is understood about the role of dynamic information in haptic object recognition. In this study we examined if motion, particularly dynamic object parts, is combined with shape information in the representation of an object in haptic memory. In our behavioural studies we found that target objects previously learned as moving objects were more easily recognized when presented dynamically than when presented as static objects, even though, shape information alone was sufficient to recognize each object. Moreover, cross-modal, visuo-tactile object recognition was better for dynamic than static objects. © 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.