Dissociation between motor commitment and response organisation

Investigate whether reverberation and HRTF mismatch affect distinct stages of the sensorimotor process, producing a dissociation between early motor commitment and overall response organisation during spatial auditory orienting.

Background

The study found that HRTF condition influenced movement planning, whereas reverberation and HRTF condition jointly affected overall response time. The authors interpret this pattern as potentially indicating that early motor commitment and later response organisation are partially separable stages of sensorimotor spatial hearing.

The available data do not resolve whether this apparent dissociation is genuine. Targeted experiments are therefore needed to determine whether reverberation and HRTF mismatch selectively influence different stages of orienting behaviour.

References

However, the present data do not allow this possibility to be interpreted conclusively, and it warrants targeted investigation in future studies.

— Beyond Localisation Accuracy: Sensorimotor Effects of HRTF Individualisation  (2609.08422 - Missoni et al., 8 Sep 2026) in Discussion and conclusions, paragraph “An interpretation of aurally-guided visual search as a sensorimotor process”