Representational momentum beyond the target?

Whether the motion of a target could influence the represented location of another stimulus was examined. In Experiment 1, judged location of a stationary object was displaced in the direction of motion of a subsequent moving target. In Experiment 2, forward displacement of the judged locations of two sequentially presented targets moving along the same path was not influenced by whether the targets moved in the same direction or in opposite directions. In Experiment 3, forward displacement of the judged locations of two simultaneously presented targets moving along different paths was larger when targets moved in the same direction than when targets moved in opposite directions, In Experiment 4, the judged location of the second (trailing) of two simultaneously presented targets moving along the same path was displaced forward, but the judged location of the first (leading) target was displaced backward; this pattern offers a novel interpretation of the tandem effect based on representational momentum and is consistent with anisotropy of the displacement of the leading edge and trailing edge of a single target. The patterns of displacement across experiments are consistent with the hypothesis that the representational momentum of a moving target can extend beyond that target to influence the represented location of another stimulus. Data and stimulus materials are available from the authors.