Table Of ContentINVESTIGATING THE RELATIONS BETWEEN
OBJECT AFFORDANCE AND PERCEPTION
USING BEHAVIOURAL AND BRAIN IMAGING EXPERIMENTS
by
MELANIE WULFF
A thesis submitted to the
University of Birmingham for the degree of
DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
School of Psychology
College of Life and Environmental Sciences
University of Birmingham
September 2015
University of Birmingham Research Archive
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ABSTRACT
Previous research has shown facilitatory effects on attention and perception when object
pairs are positioned for action compared to when they are not positioned for action. The
present thesis aimed to better understand the mechanisms underlying this paired-object
affordance effect. Chapters 2 and 3 showed that different but interacting parieto-frontal
networks contribute to the effects of paired-object affordance in healthy participants. Chapters
4 and 5 explored the effects of paired-object affordance on visual extinction; the data showed
that recovery from extinction was sensitive to the familiarity of the object pair and the
completeness of the active object rather than the passive object within an interacting pair.
Finally, the role of contextual information and task demands on the automatic perception of
paired-object affordance effects was directly explored. The results indicate that only explicit
but not implicit task demands (searching for an action vs. a colour pair, respectively) had
facilitatory effects on performance and that semantic information in a scene also modulates
the automatic perception of paired-object affordance. The findings provide novel behavioural
and neuroimaging evidence that paired-object affordance is influenced by contextual
information and task demands, with the active object (the tool) within a pair modulating the
allocation of attention.
To my parents, Norbert and Marianne,
Without whom none of my journey would be possible
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I would like to thank my wonderful supervisors, Professor Glyn Humphreys and Dr Pia
Rotshtein for their guidance, patience, encouragement, inspiration, and unwavering support
beyond academia – I cannot thank you enough for that.
I am grateful to my closest friends, in particular Maliheh Taheri, Robin Green, Rainer
Bögle, Yuanyuan Zhao, and Nabeela Akhtar for your friendship, love and support. A big
thank you also goes to my friends and colleagues at the University of Birmingham to make
my stay in Birmingham an once-in-a-lifetime experience.
I would also like to thank my previous housemates Daisy Jing Lyu and Ed Corless for their
“distraction” and the big hugs when needed. I would also like to thank Ed for proofreading the
final version.
I would also like to thank all the study participants for their time.
Most importantly, I would like to say Danke schön to my parents for their love,
unconditional support, and encouragement throughout my life for which I am overwhelmingly
grateful. I would also like to give special thanks to Helen Grant-Taylor, my Australian mum,
for being there for me during the most difficult time in my life. I would also like to thank my
best friend, Angela Ritter, for always being there for me. Finally, special thanks to Jamie
Barrett, for your patience, hugs, and so many laughs throughout the last couple of months.
TABLE OF CONTENT
CHAPTER 1: GENERAL INTRODUCTION ...................................................................... 1
1.1 Introduction ........................................................................................................................ 1
1.2 Affordance ........................................................................................................................... 1
1.3 Paired-object affordance .................................................................................................... 7
1.3.1 Mechanisms underlying paired-object affordance .......................................................... 10
1.4 Dual-route model from vision to action .......................................................................... 12
1.5 Neurocognitive models related to affordance ................................................................ 14
1.5.1 Tool-selective network .................................................................................................... 14
1.5.2 Action observation network ............................................................................................ 16
1.5.3 Mirror neuron system ...................................................................................................... 17
1.6 Overview of the thesis ...................................................................................................... 20
CHAPTER 2: DISTINCT NEURAL EFFECTS OF PERSPECTIVE AND HAND
ALIGNMENT ON PAIRED-OBJECT AFFORDANCE: AN FMRI STUDY ................. 22
2.1 Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 22
2.2 Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 23
2.3 Methods ............................................................................................................................. 29
2.3.1 Participants ...................................................................................................................... 29
2.3.2 Stimuli ............................................................................................................................. 29
2.3.3 Design and procedure ...................................................................................................... 32
2.3.4 fMRI data acquisition ...................................................................................................... 33
2.3.5 fMRI data analysis ........................................................................................................... 33
2.4 Results ................................................................................................................................ 35
2.4.1 Behavioural results .......................................................................................................... 35
2.4.2 Imaging data .................................................................................................................... 36
2.4.2.1 Visual-based affordance cues ....................................................................................... 37
2.4.2.2 Motor-based affordance cues........................................................................................ 39
2.4.2.3 Combined visual- and motor-based affordance cues .................................................... 40
2.5 Discussion .......................................................................................................................... 44
2.5.1 Neural correlates for visual-based affordance cues ......................................................... 45
2.5.2 Neural correlates for motor-based affordance cues ......................................................... 47
2.5.3 Effects of visual perspective – combined visual- and motor-based affordance cues ...... 49
2.6 Study limitations ............................................................................................................... 51
2.7 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 53
CHAPTER 3: PAIRED-OBJECT AFFORDANCE AFFECTS MOTOR CORTEX
EXCITABILITY ..................................................................................................................... 54
3.1 Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 54
3.2 Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 55
3.3 Method ............................................................................................................................... 59
3.3.1 Participants ...................................................................................................................... 59
3.3.2 TMS and MEP recording ................................................................................................. 59
3.3.3 Apparatus and stimuli ...................................................................................................... 61
3.3.4 Design and procedure ...................................................................................................... 64
3.3.5 Data analysis .................................................................................................................... 65
3.4 Results ................................................................................................................................ 66
3.4.1 Effects of hand presence .................................................................................................. 66
3.4.2 Effects of action relation, hand posture and hand alignment .......................................... 67
3.5 Discussion .......................................................................................................................... 70
3.5.1 Effects of action relation, hand posture, and hand alignment on MEP response ............ 70
3.5.2 Differences between left and right M1 excitability ......................................................... 74
3.5.3 Effects of hand presence on MEP response .................................................................... 76
3.6 Conclusion ......................................................................................................................... 77
CHAPTER 4: VISUAL RESPONSES TO ACTION BETWEEN UNFAMILIAR
OBJECT PAIRS MODULATE EXTINCTION .................................................................. 78
4.1 Abstract ............................................................................................................................. 78
4.2 Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 79
4.3 Methods ............................................................................................................................. 83
4.3.1 Patients ............................................................................................................................ 83
4.3.2 Apparatus and stimuli ...................................................................................................... 87
4.3.3 Design and procedure ...................................................................................................... 90
4.4 Results ................................................................................................................................ 92
4.4.1 The presence of extinction ............................................................................................... 92
4.4.2 Effects of action relation on two-item report................................................................... 95
4.4.3 Effects of action relation on identification errors on two-item trials .............................. 97
4.5 Discussion ........................................................................................................................ 102
4.6 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 105
CHAPTER 5: EFFECTS OF BROKEN AFFORDANCE ON VISUAL EXTINCTION
................................................................................................................................................ 107
5.1 Abstract ........................................................................................................................... 107
5.2 Introduction .................................................................................................................... 108
5.3 Methods ........................................................................................................................... 112
5.3.1 Patients .......................................................................................................................... 112
5.3.2 Apparatus and stimuli .................................................................................................... 114
5.3.3 Design and procedure .................................................................................................... 117
5.4 Results .............................................................................................................................. 119
5.4.1 The presence of extinction ............................................................................................. 121
5.4.2 Effects of object pair type on two-item report (intact handles) ..................................... 124
5.4.3 Role of broken handles on two-item trial performance ................................................. 126
5.4.4 Effect of stimulus type on one-item report .................................................................... 132
5.5 Discussion ........................................................................................................................ 133
5.5.1 Effects independent of the broken handle ..................................................................... 134
5.5.2 Effects when a handle was broken ................................................................................ 135
5.6 Study limitations ............................................................................................................. 139
5.7 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 140
CHAPTER 6: EFFECTS OF PAIRED-OBJECT AFFORDANCE IN SEARCH TASKS
ACROSS THE ADULT LIFESPAN ................................................................................... 141
6.1 Abstract ........................................................................................................................... 141
6.2 Introduction .................................................................................................................... 142
6.3 Method ............................................................................................................................. 153
6.3.1 Participants .................................................................................................................... 153
6.3.2 Stimuli and design ......................................................................................................... 154
6.3.3 Procedure ....................................................................................................................... 158
6.3.4 Data analysis .................................................................................................................. 159
6.4 Results .............................................................................................................................. 159
6.5 Discussion ........................................................................................................................ 169
6.5.1 Effects of procedural knowledge – selection priority for the active object – direct route
for action retrieval .............................................................................................................. 170
6.5.2 Effects of semantic distracters – indirect semantic route for action retrieval ............... 174
6.5.3 Retrieval of action knowledge across the lifespan ........................................................ 176
6.6 Study limitations ............................................................................................................. 178
6.7 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 179
CHAPTER 7: GENERAL DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS .................................. 180
7.1 Summary of thesis .......................................................................................................... 181
7.2 Paired-object affordance ................................................................................................ 185
7.2.1 Automaticity and the role of context and task demands ................................................ 185
7.2.2 The role of attention in paired-object affordance .......................................................... 187
7.2.3 Mechanisms underlying paired-object affordance ........................................................ 188
7.2.4 Affordance in relation to other perception-action theories ............................................ 191
7.3 Future studies .................................................................................................................. 194
7.4 Conclusion ....................................................................................................................... 196
APPENDICES ....................................................................................................................... 197
REFERENCES ..................................................................................................................... 201
* Chapters 4 and 5 are published journal articles.
LIST OF FIGURES
Figure 2.1. Examples of two-item stimuli presented from a first-person perspective (a), and
from a third-person perspective (b). The objects were positioned as interacting pairs
(left panels) or as non-interacting pairs (right panels). The active object (the bottle
opener) was grasped either by the right hand (right-handed action; upper panels) or
the left hand (left-handed action; lower panels). ..................................................... 31
Figure 2.2. Activation foci for main effect of action relation (AR > NAR) were overlaid on a
single-participant structural MNI-template (FWE-corrected p < .05; cluster defining
threshold p < .01, uncorrected). The bar graph shows the averaged effect size
extracted from a 6-mm sphere centred on the peak coordinate of inferior parietal
lobule (IPL; circled in red), precuneus and superior temporal gyrus (STG)/middle
temporal gyrus (MTG). Error bars show SEMs. Abbreviations: AR = action
relation; NAR = no action relation; 1PP = first-person perspective; 3PP = third-
person perspective; RH = right-handed action; LH = left-handed action. ............... 38
Figure 2.3. Activation foci for the main effect of hand alignment (LH > RH) were overlaid on
a single-participant structural MNI-template (FWE-corrected p < .05; cluster
defining threshold p < .01, uncorrected). The bar graph shows the averaged effect
size extracted from a 6-mm sphere centred on the peak coordinate of superior
medial frontal gyrus (SmFG; circled in red). Error bars show SEMs. Abbreviations:
AR = action relation; NAR = no action relation; 1PP = first-person perspective;
3PP = third-person perspective; RH = right-handed action; LH = left-handed action.
.................................................................................................................................. 39
