Intermittent control and retinal optic flow when maintaining a curvilinear path
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-025-02402-3
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Summary
This study investigates the relationship between visual perception and human locomotor control during curvilinear navigation, specifically addressing how retinal optic flow and vehicular heading cues trigger intermittent steering corrections. While vision’s role in navigation is well-established, the specific link between visual stimuli and the intermittent, corrective nature of human motor control has remained poorly understood. The authors aim to bridge gaps between psychology, biomechanics, and control theory by quantifying how visual inputs result in ballistic steering adjustments, challenging classical continuous control models in favor of an intermittent control framework based on satisficing behavior. To address this, the researchers conducted a simulated virtual reality experiment with fourteen participants driving through a texture-rich environment with left and right curve bends. The study reconstructed dense retinal optic flow fields by combining numerical estimation of optic flow with measured gaze behavior. A novel method using particle swarm optimization was employed to identify constituent ballistic corrections within complex, overlapping steering data. The experimental design included a condition where the vehicle-fixed steering wheel was visually removed to assess the impact of ego-state perception on control performance. Cross-correlation analysis was used to determine the time delay between stimulus onset and steering correction onset, allowing for the estimation of human cognitive latency. The results demonstrate that human steering behavior is best described by intermittent control, characterized by trains of ballistic movements rather than continuous adjustment. Specifically, the study identified a human response time of approximately 0.14 seconds for retinal optic flow-based cues and 0.44 seconds for heading-based cues, measured from stimulus onset to steering correction onset. When the steering wheel was visually removed, these response times were further delayed by 0.17 seconds, indicating that the perception of the ego-state influences control performance. The findings support the hypothesis that humans utilize readily available visual information and internal models to initiate informed ballistic corrections only when a perceived need arises, aligning with the sustained sensorimotor model. The significance of this work lies in its integration of disparate scientific domains to provide a unified understanding of human locomotor control. By confirming the intermittency property in neuromuscular control and quantifying specific response latencies for different visual cues, the study offers empirical evidence against classical continuous control strategies. It suggests that human control is energy-efficient and driven by muscle synergies activated through evidence accumulation. These insights have implications for modeling human behavior in automated systems, understanding sensorimotor integration, and refining theories of how visual motion flow guides egomotion in dynamic environments.
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| Stage | Outcome | Tool | Model | Prompt | Attempts | Completed |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| discover | success | Crossref | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-25 |
| archive | success | canonical_url | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-26 |
| extract | success | cached | — | — | 2 | 2026-06-26 |
| clean | success | clean | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-25 |
| chunk | success | chunk | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-25 |
| embed | success | embed | Qwen/Qwen3-Embedding-8B | — | 1 | 2026-06-25 |
| promote | success | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-25 |
| summarize | success | llm | qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant | summ-v5 | 1 | 2026-06-26 |
| tag | success | vector_similarity | — | — | 6 | 2026-06-25 |
| verify | partial | — | — | — | 1 | 2026-06-26 |
Summary generated by qwen3.6-27b-prismaquant on 2026-06-26; verification: verified_with_issues.
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- Empirical Findings: behavioral performance data