Predictive processing inbiological motion perceptionin audiovisual context

Abstract

Visual perception of biological motion (BM) is essential in comprehending our environment. Despitethe well-established contribution of cross-modal priming to our understanding of BM perception, theinfluence of expectations in audiovisual settings remains unexplored. The present study investigatesthe impact of congruent and incongruent auditory cues on detecting BMs presented in point-light dis-plays, exploring the impact of predictive processing on BM perception in the audiovisual context.Participants viewed either congruent auditory priors, which gave the correct information aboutthe BM, or incongruent priors. They were required to detect the BMs as fast and accurately as pos-sible. Our findings revealed shorter reaction times in congruent trials than incongruent ones althoughaccuracy remained unaffected by congruency. Overall, our results highlight that while prior informa-tion can facilitate faster detection of human motion, it does not necessarily enhance accuracy.