Article

The purpose of this study was to investigate the influence of object function and
the observer's action capabilities on grasp facilitation. We used a
stimulus-response compatibility (SRC) protocol in which participants were asked
to reach and grasp a drinking glass using one of two grasps - the thumb-up or the
thumb-down grasp. The reaction time (RT) was used as the index of grasp
facilitation. In Experiment 1, we found evidence for the facilitation of
"functionally relevant" grasps - where the type of grasp facilitated depended on
the location of opening but not the shape of the object. However, this effect was
found only when attention was directed toward the location of the opening. In
Experiments 2 and 3, we found that this facilitation was also affected by whether
participants had the ability to functionally interact with the object. These
results show that S-R compatibilities are influenced both by the object's
function and the actor's action capabilities, and are interpreted in Gibson's
(1979) framework of affordances.
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Langue : ANGLAIS