Spontaneous blinking in communication and conscious processing of information. ; Clignements spontanés dans la communication et le traitement conscient de l'information

The Spontaneous Blink (SB) differs from the voluntary blink and the reflex blink. Variations in the SB rate (SBR) are not explained by the need to lubricate the cornea alone. Decreases in SBR have been correlated with attention, concentration and visual perception, increases in SBR with memory and speech. The increase in SBR observed during a conversation has been attributed to a meta-linguistic mechanism for organizing exchanges and punctuating speech between partners. The present thesis relativizes the role of SB in human communication. Indeed, our first two studies (Articles 1 and 2) show that variations in SB between partners (mothers with their infants) are not mimetic and not subject to a coupling effect between partners. On the contrary, we show (Article 3, Experiment 1) that SB depends first of all on an individual information processing mechanism. The interpersonal communication function of SB would therefore be subsidiary (Article 3, Experiment 2), since SB is essentially linked to individual (unilateral) cognitive processes, useful for communication, but dedicated to a more general function of information processing. To confirm this hypothesis, we tested (in a novel paradigm) the variation of SB during the haptic processing, with or without vision (Article 4, Experiment 1). We show (Article 4, Experiment 2) that SB emerges primarily from the co-occurring activation of top down (mental representation and intention) and bottom up (sensoriality) processes. Taken together, these results support that SB is a phenomenon that accompanies the attentional processing of information. CB would be the marker of the conscious processing of internal (reflexive) or external (sensory) information, which we try to explain by the enactive model. ; Le Clignement Spontané des yeux (CS) se distingue du clignement volontaire et du clignement reflexe. Les variations du taux de CS (TCS) ne sont pas expliquées par la seule nécessité de lubrifier la cornée. Des baisses de TCS ont été corrélées avec l’attention, la concentration ...