Active Perception

A view of perception in which the perceiver is not a passive receiver of stimuli but an active agent who moves, orients, and manipulates the environment to gather the sensory information needed for a task. In accessibility and sensory substitution research, active perception is central: a blind user sweeping a white cane, panning a camera-based assistive device across a room, or tilting their head to resolve spatial audio cues is engaged in sensorimotor exploration that shapes what is perceived. Prior sensory substitution research has shown that proficiency with substitution devices depends on this kind of active engagement rather than on passively received descriptions.