Illusions of head and visual target displacement induced by vibration of neck muscles.

Abstract

Vibration of the posterior muscles of the neck in human subjects induces illusions of displacement and movement of a visual target when there is no visual reference (Biguer et al., 1988). Although illusions of head movement are rarely reported by subjects, when they point to the location of the nose they demonstrate an alteration of the perceived position of the head. The kinaesthetic illusion is in a direction consistent with the visual illusion but is of smaller magnitude.