Perception and motor control

Following the exploration of brain mechanisms in 0HV40, tThis course addresses the fundamental basics of the perception action cycle. Students examine how sensory information is processed in the brain and learn to understand perception’s role in shaping our experience and responses. This way students are equipped with fundamental insights that underly practical application of novel technologies like virtual reality, robotics, and AI, some topics of which are covered in 0HV140 and 0HV100. This course s includes the following topics:

Psychophysics and signal detection theory - perceptual processes are noisy, they differ over time and from person to person, and the relevant variables are latent. Psychophysics and signal detection theory are well-established methods for measuring human perceptual processes.

Sensory organs and the senses - Our sensory organs provide information about our own bodies and the world, so it is important to study the transduction processes in detail. Despite appearances, sensory information is usually not physically correct, which begs the question how they can work at all.

Vision - Vision is our dominant sense and is far superior to generic artificial vision. This just shows that many perceptual functions are only partially understood. This topic addresses the basics of visual perception such as spatial vision, color vision, depth perception, motion perception and the relation to display technology.

Sound perception - Just by listening people easily distinguish voices, musical instruments, material properties, environmental properties and sound sources. Like vision human sound perception is far superior to any artificial system, and only partially understood. This topic addresses pitch perception, loudness perceptions, sound localization and speech perception.

Haptics - Manipulating objects relies on a very sophisticated sense of touch. We feel weights, roughness, volume, material, slippage and much more. Together with the vestibular system and proprioception touch provides detailed information about the relation of our body to objects in the world.

Motor control - Muscles flex our joints and they are mostly controlled by our nervous system. The mapping from a motor plan to the actual movement is highly non-trivial, however. Here the basics are treated about the skeletal and muscle systems, and functional theories about motor control

Perception and action - We perceive to act, we act to perceive. Perception and action are not independent, but highly intertwined. This topic addresses the interdependencies of perceptual and motor systems.

After completing this course, students should be able to:

• Explain the human perception-action cycle and sensory processing mechanisms.
• Evaluate functional properties of sensory organs and motor control.
• Model perceptual systems and motor control processes.
• Learn psyhophysicalpsychophysical research methods
• Understand signal detection theory
• Apply theory to simple perceptual and motor control experiments.
• Demonstrate analytical reasoning when discussing complex perceptual systems.

You must meet the following requirements

• Registered for a degree programme other than
• HBO-TOP Applied Physics, Pre-Master

• D.A. Rosenbaum (2010). Human Motor Control, 2nd Ed., Amsterdam: Academic Press. (ISBN 978-1-84169-699-7)
• G. Mather (2016). Foundations of Sensation and Perception, 3rd Ed., Oxon: Routledge. (ISBN 978-0-12-3742261)