Theoretical Basis of Human Sensory and Motor Processing in Simple Reaction Time Tasks

Simple reaction time (SRT) is the minimum time taken to make a motor response given a sensory stimulus. Studies on SRT help uncover pathways by which sensory and motor processing take place. A theoretical framework based on the entropy of the stimulus has been used to derive an equation governing SRT. This thesis explores the efficacy of this SRT model. The derived equation generates accurate predictions not only for reaction time, but also for threshold experiments governing the tradeoff between stimulus duration and intensity. The results from both experiments can be described by equations derived from the entropy model using the same set of parameters. The results of this study not only provide a promising method for studying sensorimotor integration, it also demonstrates the ability of the entropy model to unify both sensory and motor processes.M.A.S