Senses Lab
Research
Our lab investigates perception and how observers integrate sensory information across sight, sound, touch, and cognition. Based at the School of Psychology at the University of Sydney, we focus on how perception operates when people are moving—linking real-world behavior with underlying mechanisms and neural substrates.
We study vision in dynamic environments. Current themes include recalibration mechanisms that allow the visual system to adapt to changing input, motion perception for the moving observer, and the perception of transparent motion and complex flow fields. Together, these projects examine how the brain maintains stable perception while we move through the world.
Our experiments combine controlled psychophysics with measurements of neurophysiological performance indicators. We use movement simulators and immersive virtual reality to study perception during locomotion and interaction with nearby objects, enabling precise linkage between behavioral performance and the conditions of self-motion.
A key line of work examines how tracking of peripersonal space changes with the speed and phase of locomotion and how detection performance can fluctuate across the stride cycle. Related studies probe how the visual system updates expectations to preserve stability as sensory statistics shift.
Our goal is to advance fundamental understanding of perception in moving observers and to clarify how sensory systems recalibrate to maintain perceptual stability. We collaborate internationally, including with Utrecht University (Netherlands) on motion adaptation and temporal aspects of object representation, and with the University of Dundee (UK) on historical aspects of vision science.
Connections
Address: School of Psychology, Griffith Taylor Building (A19), The University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia
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