Internal models of the human hand affect recognition of graspable objects

Abstract

For human object recognition, there is a possibility that recognition for graspable objects becomes possible with an internal hand model acquired through motor experience. From this point of view, we examined whether the internal hand model affects object recognition or not. In the measurement experiment, firstly, participants acquired a novel internal hand model by repeating a grasping task of an object displayed on a monitor, under the condition that geometrically transformed a displayed hand shape. After the training, we measured whether participant recognized a displayed object (cylinder) as a cup or not. As a result, we ascertained that the cognitive judgment depends on the amplitude of the geometrical transformation of the displayed hand. This result indicates that the trained internal hand model affects object recognition. Finally, we conclude that an internal model of the human hand may play an important role for object recognition of graspable objects.