Strong anticipation: Sensitivity to long-range correlations in synchronization behavior

Strong anticipation has emerged as a new framework for studying prospective control. According to earlier theories of prediction, anticipatory behavior rests on temporally local predictions from internal models. Strong anticipation eschews internal models and draws on the embedding of an organism in its environment. In this formulation, behavior is sensitive to the non-local temporal structure of the environment. We present initial evidence for strong anticipation in a synchronization task with tapping as the behavior. Participants were instructed to synchronize, to the best of their abilities, with a (unpredictable) chaotic signal. Our data suggest a close relationship between the long-range correlations of the chaotic signal and the long-range correlations of the synchronization behavior.