Perception of the Visual Vertical: Utricular and Somatosensory Contributions

Summary. The subjective visual vertical (SV) has been investigated in centrifugation experiments in order to test the hypothesis, that changes in the SV are proportional to changes in the shear force acting on the utricles. The resuits deviate from those predicted from the "shear hypothesis." This deviation can be accounted for by assuming that the SV is determined by the average of utricular and somaesthetic inputs.