Vestibular information contributes to update retinotopic maps

IN order to investigate the contribution of the vestibular system to spatia l orientation, we studied memory-guided saccades in three conditions: visua l-memory guided saccades (ViC), saccades to the remembered spatiotopic posi tion of a visual target, after whole-body rotation (SVeC) and saccades to t he remembered retinotopic position of a visual target, after whole-body rot ation (RVeC). Visual feedback presented after each trial allowed eye positi on correction. The error was larger in SVeC, but the performance improved t hroughout the experiment (learning) in that condition only. As learning occ urred over the first four trials, we omitted these trials from the average computation, and the significant difference between the conditions disappea red. It is concluded that vestibular information does contribute to update the internal spatial representation of visual information when a visual fee dback is provided. (C) 1999 Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.