Multisensory Integration of Echolocation and Vision in Mammals

There is limited research discussing comparative multisensory integration in echolocating mammals. Multisensory integration is the combination of redundant stimulus information from multiple sensory modalities. Through multisensory integration, sensory information from multiple modalities can influence an animal or human’s behaviour. The current paper reviews the experimental findings of studies in bats, toothed whales, and humans that test or indirectly suggest multisensory integration of echolocation, vision, and equilibrioception. We focus on these sensory modalities because they dominant the current literature on multisensory integration with echolocation. Experimental evidence to date strongly supports the importance of multisensory integration of echolocation with vision and/or equilibrioception for processes such as navigation, object recognition, and social communication. Additionally, we discuss opportunities for further research and the importance of comparative approaches for directing studies in humans.