Cite as:
Kappers A M L, Douw F T, 2010, "Hand movement investigations inspired by Yarbus" Perception 39 ECVP Abstract Supplement, page 67

Hand movement investigations inspired by Yarbus

A M L Kappers, F T Douw

Inspired by the work of Yarbus [1967 Eye movements and vision (Plenum Press, New York)] on eye movements, we investigated the dependence of hand movements on ‘scene’ and question about the scene. Our scenes consisted of arrays of 3×3 samples of materials (each sample 10×10 cm), that could differ in material properties, such as roughness or heat conductance, or in orientation of texture. Questions we asked our participants were, for example, “Which of the 9 samples feels coldest?”; “Describe the relief”; “Which sample is the roughest?”. We used an Optotrack system to track the position of the index finger of the dominant hand. Our results show that different materials and different questions lead to very distinctive movement patterns, whereas different participants produce remarkably similar movement patterns. We were able to classify the patterns by using algorithms that detected ‘roundness’, ‘straightness’ and ‘static touch’. Future investigations should lead to a more comprehensive classification.
[Supported by EU-project “THE Hand Embodied” (#248587)]

These web-based abstracts are provided for ease of seaching and access, but certain aspects (such as as mathematics) may not appear in their optimum form. For the final published version of this abstract, please see
ECVP 2010 Abstract Supplement (complete) size: 3078 Kb

[Publisher's note: The abstracts in this year's ECVP supplement have been published with virtually no copy editing by Pion, thus the standards of grammar and style may not match those of regular Perception articles.]