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A perception-action strategy for hummingbirds

Delafield-Butt, Jonathan and Galler, Andreas and Schögler, Benjaman and Lee, David (2010) A perception-action strategy for hummingbirds. Perception, 39. pp. 1172-1174. ISSN 0301-0066

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Abstract

Many human and animal tasks are thought to be controlled with the tau informational variable. It is widely accepted that controlling the rate of change of tau during decelerative tasks, such as when braking or landing, is one common perceptual control strategy. However, many tasks require accelerating before decelerating to a goal, such as reaching. An advancement of tau theory shows how a single action formula may be used to control the full action unit from initiation to peak velocity, and to rest at the goal, with the same perceptual tau information as before and accounting for the same decelerative kinematics as before. Here, we test the theory against data from high-speed video of a hummingbird flying to its flower feeder. We find that the theory accounts for 97% of the variance in the data, and thus supports it.

Item type: Article
ID code: 39810
Keywords: perception, action, tau theory, motor control, hummingbirds, Special aspects of education, Psychology
Subjects: Education > Special aspects of education
Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > Psychology
Department: Faculty of Humanities And Social Sciences > Education
Related URLs:
    Depositing user: Pure Administrator
    Date Deposited: 29 May 2012 10:32
    Last modified: 20 Jul 2012 16:00
    URI: http://strathprints.strath.ac.uk/id/eprint/39810

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