An interventional study of Behavioral protocol and EEG protocol in Visual Impairment and Healthy, sponsored by Hospices Civils de Lyon. Recruiting at 1 site in France. Open to participants aged 18 Years to 60 Years, including healthy volunteers. Per ClinicalTrials.gov, last updated 2026-03-24.
Sponsored by Hospices Civils de Lyon · Not applicable, Interventional, and Basic science
The use of tools is ubiquitous in our lives and allows us to expand the sensorimotor capacities of our body. Much research has been done on the subject in sighted people over the past decades. This work has mainly focused on the motor aspect of using the tool, neglecting the sensory aspect. However, any action involving a tool carries sensory information, for example in the use of the white cane by blind people. 26% (> 200,000) of blind people in France use a white cane to get around. By sweeping the cane on the ground, they use it as a sensorimotor extension of their body to extract information from the environment in order to locate a pedestrian crossing or possible obstacles. While it is well established that the tools increase the user's motor skills, we have only just begun to clarify how they also function as sensory extensions of the user's body and how this phenomenon is potentially dependent on constant use of the tool to compensate for a missing sense, as is the case with blind people using a cane. The aim of this study is to fill this important gap in our knowledge.
360 studies on the registry are indexed under Vision Disorders; 84 are open to participants now.
This study's planned enrollment of 300 is above the median of 78 across 244 interventional studies indexed under Vision Disorders.
Browse Vision Disorders studies →Hospices Civils de Lyon is the lead sponsor of 1,866 studies on the registry; 448 are open to participants now.
Counted across the registry records on this site, refreshed daily.
Go through the criteria one by one — yes, no or not sure — and take the list to your doctor or the study team. Kept in this browser only.
Specific of the non-sighted participants:
Exclusion Criteria:
A person who is not eligible to a MRI-exam according to the following criteria cannot be admitted to the experiments including MR acquisitions :
Underlined terms in the criteria open these too. Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
Before you join, the study team explains what taking part involves — its purpose, what happens, the risks and possible benefits — and answers your questions, so you can decide freely. Consent is usually recorded on a form (the informed consent form, ICF) signed by you or, where the law allows, by someone legally authorised to decide for you.
You can keep asking questions during the study, you are told of new information that matters, and you can choose to leave at any time.
Informed consent
Before you join, the study team explains what taking part involves — its purpose, what happens, the risks and possible benefits — and answers your questions, so you can decide freely. Consent is usually recorded on a form (the informed consent form, ICF) signed by you or, where the law allows, by someone legally authorised to decide for you.
You can keep asking questions during the study, you are told of new information that matters, and you can choose to leave at any time.
Explained by clinicaltrials.gg, not part of the registry record. The study team decides who can take part.
If participants accepts (non-sighted participants and Healthy volunteers), they will carry out the behavioral protocol and the EEG protocol and fMRI protocol.
Behavioral: Behavioral protocol · Device: EEG protocol · Device: fMRI protocol
Participants who agree to participate in only one of the experiments (EEG or MRI) will be assigned to either the EEG or fMRI type of study in each subgroup. All participants (non-sighted participants and Healthy volunteers) will do the behavioral session and at least one EEG or MRI session.
Behavioral: Behavioral protocol · Device: EEG protocol
Participants who agree to participate in only one of the experiments (EEG or MRI) will be assigned to either the EEG or fMRI type of study in each subgroup. All participants (non-sighted participants and Healthy volunteers) will do the behavioral session and at least one EEG or MRI session.
Behavioral: Behavioral protocol · Device: fMRI protocol
A touch sensitive computer screen either displaying a downscaled (45cm long) image of the rod (for the sighted), or supporting a same sized wooden rod (for the blind), will be placed on the table in front of the participant to record their localization performance. They will be instructed to use their left index fingertip to indicate on the image of the screen (for sighted) or on the wooden rod (for the blind) the position where they have felt the touch provided to the 90 cm long they held in their right dominant hand. Participants will wear a headset playing white noise to prevent any auditory localization cues when the long rod will be touched. The rod will be touched by a computer controlled solenoid. Thus, participants will respond with a hand gesture on the image or rod and will be asked to validate the position by pressing a foot-pedal with their left foot.
The EEG protocol will be similar as the behavioral one described above, with the distinction of taking place in two separate sessions: one where the rod are touched, and one where their hand is touched. The participant will hold a rod in each hand and he will have to indicate on which rod he felt the touch. Additionally electrophysiological responses will be continuously recorded using a 65 channel ActiCap system (Brain Products).
The same behavioral task and procedures of the behavioral protocol described above will be applied, adapted to take into account the constraints posed by the magnetic environment of the MR scanner. The participant will be placed on the scanner bed and provided with earphones that will both protect against the noise of the machine (80dB) and ensure a continuous communication with the participant. During the fMRI sessions, the participant will solve the same rod localization behavioral task while we will record brain activations by measuring the brain oxygen level dependent signal via Echo Planar Imaging sequences. We will use an MRI compatible tactile stimulator to touch the hand-held rod and participants location judgement will be recorded by using an MRI-compatible tablet, positioned on their abdomen, where the participant will have to indicate the judged position.
Perceived location
Tactile stimulus will be applied on a tool (a rod). Subject should determine the exact spatial location of the stimulus. This will be measure at each stimulation.
Time frame: 90 minutes
Brain activity
Brain oscillatory activity and the somatosensory evoked potentials during the realization of experimental tasks on EEG. Two sessions of about 3 hours are necessary for the EEG acquisition.
Time frame: 6 hours
Brain activity
Measuring the brain oxygen level dependent (BOLD) signal during the realization of experimental tasks on fMRI
Time frame: 3 hours
Plan to share: No
No publications or documents are linked to this record.
Eligibility is decided by the study team. Share this record with your doctor or contact the team directly.
Contact study teamGet an email when the registry record changes — status, dates, results — or when someone posts here.
Sign in to followQuestions and observations about this study, from anyone following it. Not medical advice, and not a channel to the study team — their contact details are on the registry record.
Sign in to join the discussion. Reading takes no account; posting does. You choose a display name, and a pseudonym is the default.
Nothing here yet. If you are running this trial, taking part in it, or weighing whether to, this is the place to say so.