Testing an old hypothesis: how the order of skin stimulation affects perception of motion

What is it about?

This study tests the hypothesis that sensory maps of the skin learn the relative positions of skin patches based on the order in which they are stimulated during motion events. Disrupting this order should thus disrupt the map. We used ‘motion scrambling’ in which two middle locations on the forearm were touched in reversed order: 1-2-4-3-5-6, instead of 1-2-3-4-5-6. After conditioning with this pattern, the participants reported degraded direction discrimination for motion between locations 3 and 4, suggesting the beginning of re-learning of their relative positions.

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Why is it important?

This research advances our understanding of how the brain maps sensory information from the skin and has potential implications for the development of sensory prostheses and other technologies that interface with the somatosensory system.