FOR2718-A2

Amodal and Modal Representations in Planning and Control of Human Action

01/10/2023 to 30/09/2026

The first funding period revealed unexpected results on how many representations guide motor actions, how those representations can be conceptualized, and whether and how those representations can be mapped to the more general notion of modal versus amodal representations in the human cognitive system. First, the question of whether R-E learning generalizes to a superordinate category is more open than previously thought (Eichfelder et al., 2022), such that further experimentation is needed for clarification. Whether and how such a generalization happens, will allow inferences about the nature of the underlying representations. Second, the two currently best-established and least controversial lines of evidence for two separate representations underlying perception versus action also require further clarification. For Garner interference, the most critical condition of manual size estimation has hitherto only been studied in two studies (Ganel & Goodale, 2003, 2014). However, in our experiments of the first funding period, we observed contradictory results. For Weber’s law, we identified a methodological problem that affects approximately 30 published studies on this issue. In Bhatia et al. (2022b) we demonstrate this problem, show how it can be rectified, and re-analyze two key-studies on this topic. Importantly, the conclusions are different if appropriate methods are used: It seems that grasping does follow Weber’s law, contrary to the conclusions of many studies in the literature. The open question is how this relates to the many conditions that have been investigated in the remaining 30 studies. Overall, the question will be whether and under which conditions we can establish separate representations of perception and action and whether and how these can be mapped to the modal versus amodal distinction.