Using the eye-movement system to control the head

Gilchrist, I.D., Brown, V., Findlay, J.M. and Clarke, M.P. (1998) Using the eye-movement system to control the head. Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, 265 (1408), 1831-1836. (doi:10.1098/rspb.1998.0509).

Record type: Article

Abstract

We tested the hypothesis that A.I., a subject who has total opthalmoplegia, resulting in a lack of eye movements, used her head to orientate in a qualitatively similar way to eye-based orientating of control subjects. We used four classic eye-movement paradigms and measured A.I.'s head movements while she performed the tasks. These paradigms were (i) the gap paradigm, (ii) the remote-distractor effect, (iii) the anti-saccade paradigm, and (iv) tests of saccadic suppression. In all cases, A.I.'s head saccades were qualitatively similar to previously reported eye-movement data. We conclude that A.I.'s head movements are probably controlled by the same neural mechanisms that control eye movements in unimpaired subjects.

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