Elsevier

Human Movement Science

Volume 6, Issue 2, June 1987, Pages 181-199
Human Movement Science

On the type of information used to control and learn an aiming movement after moderate and extensive training

https://doi.org/10.1016/0167-9457(87)90011-XGet rights and content

Abstract

This experiment was conducted to see if, in an aiming task (MT = 550 msec), where subjects received moderate (200 trials) or extensive practice (2000 trials), performance would benefit from vision of the performing limb and the target to be reached when compared to a situation where only the target to be reached was visually available. As a second goal, a transfer paradigm was used to see to what extent learning was specific to the conditions under which practice occurred. The results indicated that performance was enhanced when subjects were permitted vision of the performing limb. Furthermore, the subjects who benefited from vision of the performing limb in the training period were not able, even after extensive training, to maintain performance in the transfer task (i.e., without vision of the performing limb). These results are consistent with the view that vision of the responding limb is particularly important in learning a perceptual-motor task. Moreover, practice does not decrease the importance of this information for guiding the movement as some of the past literature suggests might happen. The results are seen as supporting the notion that movement learning may involve the development of a complex sensorimotor reference mechanism that acts to control and, when necessary, modify the ongoing movement. Further, this would imply that movement learning is relatively specific to the conditions under which practice occurs.

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      Fortunately, this adverse effect disappeared in the post-test, contrary to the positive effect on movement speed and fluency, which remained in the short-term post-test. Motor learning is relatively specific to the conditions in which the practice occurs (Proteau, Marteniuk, Girouard, & Dugas, 1987). Consequently, providing supplementary FB during the training phase improves performance, but its removal during a post-test may result in performance deterioration.

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    The research reported in this paper was partially funded by grants awarded to the first and second authors by the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and to the first author by the Fonds Institutionel de Recherche from the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières. We express our thanks to Claude Brouillette and Pierre Black for development of the hardware and software and to Line Lévesque, Serge Marchand, Jean-Pierre Pellerin and Deborah Serrien for data collection.

    Mailing address: Département des sciences de l'activité physique, Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières, Trois-Rivières, Québec, Canada, G9A 5H7.

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