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Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior pp 1–4Cite as

Point Light Displays

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Synonyms

Biological motion; Point light biological motion; Single frame lifetime display

Definition

A point light display is an experimental paradigm. Instead of presenting the moving body, it only displays the movements of a few landmarks on the body, typically as white points against a dark background.

Introduction

Point light displays, usually referred to as “point light biological motion” or simply “biological motion” (see also the chapter on “Biological Motion”), have enjoyed a rich research tradition since the 1970s and have been widely applied. Fields of application involve experimental psychology, cognitive development, primate cognition, neurology, pain research, and action perception. Using point light displays in research studies is attractive, first because they are easy to generate and manipulate computationally and, second, because they allow the study of the visual perception of biological movement without the rich visual context that is typical of movies.

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References

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Movement Science, University of Münster, Münster, Germany

    Marc H. E. de Lussanet

  2. Otto Creutzfeldt Center for Cognitive and Behavioral Neuroscience (OCC), Münster, Germany

    Marc H. E. de Lussanet

Authors
  1. Marc H. E. de Lussanet
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Marc H. E. de Lussanet .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Oakland University , Rochester, MI, USA

    Jennifer Vonk

  2. Department of Psychology, Oakland University Department of Psychology, Rochester, MI, USA

    Todd Shackelford

Section Editor information

  1. University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, USA

    Khalil Iskarous

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de Lussanet, M.H.E. (2018). Point Light Displays. In: Vonk, J., Shackelford, T. (eds) Encyclopedia of Animal Cognition and Behavior. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_663-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-47829-6_663-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-47829-6

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