Perceptual control theory (PCT) proposes that perceptual inputs are controlled to intentional 'reference' states by hierarchical negative feedback control, evidence for which comes from manual tracking experiments in humans. We reviewed these experiments to determine whether tracking is a process of perceptual control, and to assess the state-of-the-evidence for PCT. A systematic literature search was conducted of peer-review journal and book chapters in which tracking data were simulated with a PCT model (13 studies, 53 participants). We report a narrative review of these studies and a qualitative assessment of their methodological quality. We found evidence that individuals track to individual-specific endogenously-specified reference states and act against disturbances, and evidence that hierarchical PCT can simulate complex tracking. PCT's learning algorithm, reorganization, was not modelled. Limitations exist in the range of tracking conditions under which the PCT model has been tested. Future PCT research should apply the PCT methodology to identify control variables in real-world tasks and develop hierarchical PCT architectures for goal-oriented robotics to test the plausibility of PCT model-based action control.

中文翻译：

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对跟踪研究中知觉控制理论证据的系统评估。

知觉控制理论（PCT）提出，通过分层的负反馈控制将知觉输入控制为有意的“参考”状态，证据来自人类的手动跟踪实验。我们回顾了这些实验，以确定跟踪是否是感知控制的过程，并评估PCT的证据状态。对同行评审期刊和书籍章节进行了系统的文献检索，其中使用PCT模型模拟了跟踪数据（13个研究，53名参与者）。我们报告了对这些研究的叙述性评论，并对其方法学质量进行了定性评估。我们发现有证据表明个体可以追踪到特定于个体的内生指定参考状态并针对干扰采取行动，并且有证据表明分层PCT可以模拟复杂的追踪。PCT的学习算法重组没有被建模。在测试PCT模型的跟踪条件范围内存在局限性。未来的PCT研究应应用PCT方法论来识别实际任务中的控制变量，并为面向目标的机器人技术开发分层PCT体系结构，以测试基于PCT模型的动作控制的合理性。