TY - JOUR
T1 - Gut estimates
T2 - Pregnant women adapt to changing possibilities for squeezing through doorways
AU - Franchak, John M.
AU - Adolph, Karen E.
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by National Institute of Health and Human Development Grant No. R37-HD33486 to K.E.A. Portions of this work were presented at the 2007 meeting of the Vision Sciences Society and the 2009 International Conference on Perception and Action. We gratefully acknowledge the members of the NYU Infant Action Lab for their help collecting the data and for providing comments on the manuscript. We thank Gladys Chan for her beautiful line drawings, and Scott R. Robinson for suggesting the title.
PY - 2014/2
Y1 - 2014/2
N2 - Possibilities for action depend on the fit between the body and the environment. Perceiving what actions are possible is challenging, because the body and the environment are always changing. How do people adapt to changes in body size and compression? In Experiment 1, we tested pregnant women monthly over the course of pregnancy to determine whether they adapted to changing possibilities for squeezing through doorways. As women gained belly girth and weight, previously passable doorways were no longer passable, but women's decisions to attempt passage tracked their changing abilities. Moreover, their accuracy was equivalent to that of nonpregnant adults. In Experiment 2, nonpregnant adults wore a "pregnancy pack" that instantly increased the size of their bellies, and they judged whether doorways were passable. Accuracy in the "pregnant" participants was only marginally worse than that of actual pregnant women, suggesting that participants adapted to the prosthesis during the test session. In Experiment 3, participants wore the pregnancy pack and gauged passability before and after attempting passage. The judgments were grossly inaccurate prior to receiving feedback. These findings indicate that experience facilitates perceptual-motor recalibration for certain types of actions.
AB - Possibilities for action depend on the fit between the body and the environment. Perceiving what actions are possible is challenging, because the body and the environment are always changing. How do people adapt to changes in body size and compression? In Experiment 1, we tested pregnant women monthly over the course of pregnancy to determine whether they adapted to changing possibilities for squeezing through doorways. As women gained belly girth and weight, previously passable doorways were no longer passable, but women's decisions to attempt passage tracked their changing abilities. Moreover, their accuracy was equivalent to that of nonpregnant adults. In Experiment 2, nonpregnant adults wore a "pregnancy pack" that instantly increased the size of their bellies, and they judged whether doorways were passable. Accuracy in the "pregnant" participants was only marginally worse than that of actual pregnant women, suggesting that participants adapted to the prosthesis during the test session. In Experiment 3, participants wore the pregnancy pack and gauged passability before and after attempting passage. The judgments were grossly inaccurate prior to receiving feedback. These findings indicate that experience facilitates perceptual-motor recalibration for certain types of actions.
KW - Locomotion
KW - Navigation
KW - Perception and action
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84898439048&partnerID=8YFLogxK
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.url?scp=84898439048&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.3758/s13414-013-0578-y
DO - 10.3758/s13414-013-0578-y
M3 - Article
C2 - 24338434
AN - SCOPUS:84898439048
SN - 1943-3921
VL - 76
SP - 460
EP - 472
JO - Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics
JF - Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics
IS - 2
ER -