Research Areas
My research activity is situated within the field of motor neuroscience, with particular attention to the relationship between visual perception, eye movements, postural control, and motor behavior. The general aim is to understand how visual information contributes to the planning, control, and adaptation of movement, both in controlled experimental settings and in ecologically valid sport-related contexts.
Cognition, Eye Movements, and Motor Behavior
One main line of research focuses on the interaction between vision, cognition, and action. In particular, my interest lies in understanding how visual perception guides and modulates motor behavior, enabling individuals to select, plan, and execute the most appropriate motor actions based on the characteristics of the environment in which they operate.
The relationship between perception and movement is fundamental to the control of motor activity. Appropriate acquisition of information from the external environment allows individuals to produce effective, rapid, and accurate motor responses. This aspect is particularly relevant in sport, where athletes must process a large amount of sensory information, interpret the game situation, anticipate the opponent’s actions, and adapt their own motor behavior within extremely limited time frames.
Elite athletes are often distinguished by a greater ability to extract relevant information from dynamic and complex scenes, to track rapidly moving elements, and to use effective visual strategies to anticipate the unfolding of an action. These skills are crucial in open-skill sports, where performance depends on the ability to make rapid decisions based on visual cues that are often partial, changing, and time-constrained.
Within this framework, I study eye movements in standardized sport-specific situations and in tasks that are as close as possible to real competition, using both video-based paradigms and real-world field tasks. The aim is to analyse the spatial and temporal interactions between gaze and body movement, with particular reference to eye-hand and eye-foot coordination.
The main variables analysed include the number and duration of ocular fixations, the characteristics of saccadic and microsaccadic eye movements, the distribution of fixations within specific areas of interest, and the sequence of visual search strategies. These indicators make it possible to reconstruct how individuals search for, select, and use visual information that is relevant for action.
A specific objective of this line of research is to examine whether, and to what extent, exercise and sport experience can modify and improve basic visuomotor functions, including those involved in motor responses to visual stimuli. Over the years, research has shown that visual perception represents an essential component of sport performance, contributing to the speed, accuracy, and effectiveness of motor actions.
From an applied perspective, this research area aims to address key questions related to education, coaching, and training: which visual information do athletes use to make effective decisions? Which environmental cues are selected and which are ignored? How can the analysis of visual strategies help coaches improve performance? Answering these questions may provide useful indications for developing more targeted and effective perceptual-motor training interventions.
Influence of Optic Flow on the Activation of Postural Muscles
A second line of research concerns the influence of optic flow on postural control and postural muscle activation. The aim is to understand how different visual motion stimuli influence balance and automatic motor responses in humans.
This research adopts an integrated approach based on stabilometric analysis using force platforms, stereophotogrammetry, and surface electromyography. This methodological combination enables simultaneous assessment of body sway and muscle activation induced by visual stimulation.
The specific objectives are to analyze postural responses to stimulation of the central and peripheral visual fields and to examine the role of optic flow velocity in modulating muscle activation. During data collection, participants are exposed to perturbing visual stimuli projected onto a screen that covers a large portion of the visual field, while stabilometric, stereophotogrammetric, and electromyographic signals are recorded simultaneously.
The analysis of the center of pressure (CoP) enables qualitative and quantitative assessment of visually induced body sway, whereas surface EMG allows identification of the onset and characteristics of postural muscle activation. Electromyographic analysis is conducted both in the time domain, using measures such as RMS, or root mean square, and in the frequency domain, through spectral analysis and median frequency.
This approach enables investigation of the neurophysiological mechanisms underlying postural control and distinguishes the contributions of feedback and feedforward control systems within the Central Nervous System to maintaining static balance under dynamic visual stimulation.
The results may help clarify the role of visual postural reflexes and their influence on the activation of the trunk, lower-limb, upper-limb, and neck muscles. The applied implications of this research concern both rehabilitation and sport. In clinical settings, the findings may be useful for assessing and treating individuals with visual deficits involving either the retina or the visual cortex, associated with perceptual and postural alterations. In sport settings, they may provide indications for the design of perceptual-motor training strategies aimed at improving balance, postural adaptation, and performance.
