Vector averaging occurs downstream from learning in smooth pursuit eye movements of monkeys

How are sensory-motor transformations organized in a cortical motor system? In general, sensory information is transformed through a variety of signal processing operations in the context of distinct coordinate frameworks. We studied the interaction of two distinct operations in pursuit eye movements, learning and vector-averaging, to gain insight into their underlying coordinate frameworks and their sequence in sensory-motor processing. Learning was induced in the initiation of pursuit eye movements by targets that moved initially at one speed for 100 msec and then increased or decreased to a sustained final speed. Vector averaging was studied by comparing the initial eye acceleration evoked by the simultaneous motion of two targets with that evoked by each target singly. Learning caused specific effects on the direction of the vector-averaged responses to two-target stimuli that included one target moving in the direction used to induce learning. Learned increases or decreases in eye acceleration caused the direction of the responses to two-targets to rotate toward or away from the learning direction. Learning also caused nonspecific changes in the responses to two-target stimuli. After any learning protocol, two-target responses usually became smaller, and their directions rotated away from the axis of the target motion used for learning. Quantitative analysis showed that the specific effects of learning were predicted most closely by a model in which vector averaging occurs downstream from the site(s) of learning. We suggest that the pursuit system creates parallel commands for potential movements to each of the targets in two-target stimuli, and that learning occurs in the coordinates of the potential movements.