The Posture-Based model of motor planning simulates how people plan and perform such actions as reaching, grasping, reaching around obstacles, hitting, and tapping. The model also examines how people are able to select a particular goal posture, and follow a trajectory to it, from among the infinite number of possibilities. The research will be undertaken in two stages. The first step is to extend algorithms now used in the existing two-dimensional model so that they can be applied to three-dimensional workspaces. The second step will be to construct workspaces, both tangible and virtual, in which specific predictions of the model may be tested. Vaughan is collaborating on the project with Professor David Rosenbaum of Pennsylvania State University and Dr. Ruud Meulenbroek of the Nijmegen Institute for Cognition and Information.
An experimental psychologist, Vaughan's research interests focus on the selection of motor movements; eye movements and attentional processes; learning; and cognitive neuropsychology. Vaughan has collaborated with Hamilton colleague Penny L. Yee in facilitating the use of computer applications in psychological research, their most recent efforts being tutorial materials for using the PsyScope program for teaching and research in Cognitive Psychology. Vaughan is also editor of the international quarterly, Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers, published by the Psychonomic Society.
