Tollin Daniel J, Ruhland Janet L, Yin Tom C T
Department of Physiology, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin, USA.
J Neurophysiol. 2009 Mar;101(3):1258-66. doi: 10.1152/jn.90977.2008. Epub 2009 Jan 7.
The mammalian orienting response to sounds consists of a gaze shift that can be a combination of head and eye movements. In animals with mobile pinnae, the ears also move. During head movements, vision is stabilized by compensatory rotations of the eyeball within the head because of the vestibulo-ocular reflex (VOR). While studying the gaze shifts made by cats to sounds, a previously uncharacterized compensatory movement was discovered. The pinnae exhibited short-latency, goal-directed movements that reached their target while the head was still moving. The pinnae maintained a fixed position in space by counter-rotating on the head with an equal but opposite velocity to the head movement. We call these compensatory ear movements the vestibulo-auricular reflex (VAR) because they shared many kinematic characteristics with the VOR. Control experiments ruled out efference copy of head position signals and acoustic tracking (audiokinetic) of the source as the cause of the response. The VAR may serve to stabilize the auditory world during head movements.
哺乳动物对声音的定向反应包括凝视转移，这可能是头部和眼睛运动的组合。在耳廓可移动的动物中，耳朵也会移动。在头部运动期间，由于前庭眼反射（VOR），眼球在头部内进行补偿性旋转，从而使视觉稳定。在研究猫对声音的凝视转移时，发现了一种以前未被描述的补偿性运动。耳廓表现出短潜伏期、目标导向的运动，在头部仍在移动时就到达了目标。耳廓通过在头部上以与头部运动相等但相反的速度反向旋转，从而在空间中保持固定位置。我们将这些补偿性耳部运动称为前庭耳反射（VAR），因为它们与VOR具有许多运动学特征。对照实验排除了头部位置信号的传出副本和对声源的声学跟踪（听觉运动）作为反应的原因。VAR可能有助于在头部运动期间稳定听觉世界。
