Recent studies have demonstrated that audition used to complement or substitute visual feedback is effective in conveying spatial information, e.g., sighted individuals can understand the curvature of a shape when solely auditory input is provided. Recently we also demonstrated that, in the absence of vision, auditory feedback of body movements can enhance spatial perception in visually impaired adults and children. In the present study, we assessed whether sighted adults can also improve their spatial abilities related to shape recognition with an audio-motor training based on the idea that the coupling of auditory and motor information can further refine the representation of space when vision is missing. Auditory shape recognition was assessed in 22 blindfolded sighted adults with an auditory task requiring participants to identify four shapes by means of the sound conveyed through a set of consecutive loudspeakers embedded on a fixed two-dimensional vertical array. We divided participants into two groups of 11 adults each, performing a training session in two different modalities: active audio-motor training (experimental group) and passive auditory training (control group). The audio-motor training consisted in the reproduction of specific movements with the arm by relying on the sound produced by an auditory source positioned on the wrist of participants. Results showed that sighted individuals improved the recognition of auditory shapes only after active training, suggesting that audio-motor feedback can be an effective tool to enhance spatial representation when visual information is lacking.

中文翻译：

---

声音形状识别：听觉运动训练后视力正常的人的改善。

最近的研究表明，用于补充或替代视觉反馈的听觉在传达空间信息方面是有效的，例如，当仅提供听觉输入时，视力正常的人可以理解形状的曲率。最近我们还证明，在没有视力的情况下，身体运动的听觉反馈可以增强视力受损的成人和儿童的空间感知。在本研究中，我们评估了有视力的成年人是否也可以通过音频运动训练提高他们与形状识别相关的空间能力，这是基于听觉和运动信息的耦合可以在视觉缺失时进一步完善空间表示的想法。听觉形状识别在 22 名被蒙住眼睛的视力正常的成年人中进行了评估，其听觉任务要求参与者通过嵌入固定二维垂直阵列的一组连续扬声器传送的声音来识别四种形状。我们将参与者分为两组，每组 11 名成人，以两种不同的方式进行训练：主动听觉运动训练（实验组）和被动听觉训练（对照组）。音频运动训练包括依靠位于参与者手腕上的听觉源产生的声音再现手臂的特定运动。结果表明，视力正常的人只有在积极训练后才能提高对听觉形状的识别，