We studied how people determine when they are in control of objects. In a computer task, participants moved a virtual boat towards a goal using a joystick to investigate how subjective control is shaped by (1) correspondence between motor actions and the visual consequences of those actions, and (2) attainment of higher-level goals. In Experiment 1, random discrepancies from joystick input (noise) decreased judgments of control (JoCs), but discrepancies that brought the boat closer to the goal and increased success (the (...) autopilot) increased JoCs. In Experiment 2, participants raced to the goal against a computer-controlled rival boat while varying levels of noise interfered with each boat. Participants reached the goal more often and rated their own control higher when the computer rival had good control. Subjective control over moving objects depends partly on consistency between motor actions and their effects, but is also modulated by perceived success and competition. -/- Keywords: Control; Action; Feedback; Competition . (shrink)

When people manipulate a moving object, such as writing with a pen or driving a car, they experience their actions as intimately related to the object’s motion, that is they perceive control. Here, we tested the hypothesis that observers would feel more control over a moving object if an unrelated task drew attention to a location to which the object subsequently moved. Participants steered an object within a narrow path and discriminated the color of a flash that appeared briefly close (...) to the object. Across two experiments, participants provided higher ratings of perceived control when an object moved over a flash’s location than when an object moved away from a flash’s location. This result suggests that we use the location of spatial attention to determine the perception of control. If an object goes where we are attending, we feel like we made it go there. (shrink)