Concurrent adaptation to four different visual rotations

Abstract

The human sensorimotor system can concurrently adapt to two different distortions without interference when the distortions are cued by different contexts. We investigated whether this holds with four distortions as well. Subjects were exposed to an interlaced sequence of +30°, -30°, +60°, and -60° visuomotor rotations as the adaptation phase, cued by combinations of workspace location and by the arm used. Adaptation phase was followed by two episodes in each condition without any distortion testing the aftereffects. Results showed that the error at the onset of adaptation gradually decreased during adaptation to all four distortions without any sign of interference between the conditions. Furthermore, aftereffects of adaptation to ±30° rotation were significantly greater than of adaptation to ±60° rotation. We conclude that the human sensorimotor system is able to concurrently adapt to four different visual distortions when they are cued by different contexts. However, the results of aftereffects are ambiguous: Recalibration could be based on at least four parallel modules. © 2012 The Author(s).