Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

In this paper we investigate the contents of object representations in action-oriented perception. We propose a view whereby perceivers represent the egocentric relationship that they have with potential perceptual objects, rendering those objects actionable for the perceiver. Further, we argue that the perceptual content associated with this actionable object representation stands apart from other standard forms of perceptual representation or experience. The actionability of perceptual objects is neither a kind of thin content (relating to bare sensory properties), nor is the content necessarily high-level (relating to personal-level cognitive conceptualization). Accordingly, we argue that the action-oriented content of perceptual experience is rich, but not so rich that it necessitates high-level representation. To draw the distinction between rich content and high-level content in object perception, we argue that high-level content is neither necessary nor sufficient for action-oriented perception. We support this claim by surveying empirical cases of optic aphasia and ideomotor apraxia.