Reafference learning in the presence of exafference

Abstract

Reafference learning has been demonstrated most clearly in the case of position-constancy adaptation in which the only stimulus change is caused by the subject's own movoment. The present study used the more ecologically representative training situation in which only part of the stimulus change is caused by the subject (reafference), while part of it is caused by an independent source (exafference). The exafference varied the space relation between subject movement and optical movement or the time relation between those two. In both cases, reafference learning was not affected by the exafference, and the subject's varied training experience resulted in a fixed expected optical movement and a fixed expected time lag. © 1981 Psychonomic Society, Inc.