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Individual differences in learning a novel discrete motor task.

ABSTRACT: Many motor learning studies focus on average performance while it is known from everyday life experience that humans differ in their way of learning new motor tasks. This study emphasises the importance of recognizing individual differences in motor learning. We studied individual tool grasping profiles of individuals who learned to pick up objects with a novel tool, a pair of pliers. The pair of pliers was attached to the thumb and the index finger so that the tip of the thumb and the tip of the index finger were displaced to the beaks of the pair of pliers. The grasp component was manipulated by varying the location of the hinge of the pair of pliers, which resulted in different relations between beak opening and closing and finger opening and closing. The Wider Beak group had the hinge at 7 cm, the Same Beak group had the hinge at 10 cm (i.e., in the middle), and the Smaller Beak group had the hinge at 13 cm from the digits. Each group consisted of ten right-handed participants who picked up an object with one of the pairs of pliers 200 times on two subsequent days. Hand opening, plateau phase, hand closing, grasping time and maximum aperture were analyzed. To characterize individual changes over practice time, a log function was fitted on these dependent variables and the ratio of improvement was determined. Results showed that at the beginning stage of tool use learning the characteristic grasping profile consisted of three phases; hand opening, plateau phase and hand closing. Over practicing individual participants differed in the number of phases that changed, the amount of change in a phase and/or the direction of change. Moreover, with different pliers different learning paths were found. The importance of recognizing individual differences in motor learning is discussed.

SUBMITTER: Golenia L

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4227849 | biostudies-literature | 2014

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Individual differences in learning a novel discrete motor task.

Golenia Laura L Schoemaker Marina M MM Mouton Leonora J LJ Bongers Raoul M RM

PloS one 20141111 11

Many motor learning studies focus on average performance while it is known from everyday life experience that humans differ in their way of learning new motor tasks. This study emphasises the importance of recognizing individual differences in motor learning. We studied individual tool grasping profiles of individuals who learned to pick up objects with a novel tool, a pair of pliers. The pair of pliers was attached to the thumb and the index finger so that the tip of the thumb and the tip of th ...[more]

PMID: 25386708

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Project description:Because of the challenges associated with measuring human perception and strategy, the process of human performance from perception to motion to results is not fully understood. Therefore, this study clarifies the phase at which errors occur and how differences in skill level manifest in a motor task requiring an accurate environmental perception and fine movement control. We assigned a golf putting task and comprehensively examined various errors committed in five phases of execution. Twelve tour professionals and twelve intermediate amateur golfers performed the putting task on two surface conditions: flat and a 0.4-degree incline. The participants were instructed to describe the topographical characteristics of the green before starting the trials on each surface (environmental perception phase). Before each attempt, the participants used the reflective markers to indicate their aim point from which the ball would be launched (decision-making phase). We measured the clubface angle and impact velocity to highlight the pre-motion and motion errors (pre-motion and motion phase). In addition, mistakes in the final ball position were analyzed as result errors (post-performance phase). Our results showed that more than half of the amateurs committed visual-somatosensory errors in the perception phase. Moreover, their aiming angles in the decision-making phase differed significantly from the professionals, with no significant differences between slope conditions. In addition, alignment errors, as reported in previous studies, occurred in the pre-motion phase regardless of skill level (i.e., increased in the 0.4-degree condition). In the motion phase, the intermediate-level amateurs could not adjust their clubhead velocity control to the appropriate level, and the clubhead velocity and clubface angle control were less reproducible than those of the professionals. To understand the amateur result errors in those who misperceived the slopes, we checked the individual results focusing on the final ball position. We found that most of these participants had poor performance, especially in the 0.4-degree condition. Our results suggest that the amateurs' pre-motion and strategy errors depended on their visual-somatosensory errors.

Dataset Information

Individual differences in learning a novel discrete motor task.

Publications

Individual differences in learning a novel discrete motor task.

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