Influence of cueing on the preparation and execution of untrained and trained complex motor responses

Abstract

This study investigated the influence of cueing on the performance of untrained and trained complex motor responses. Healthy adults responded to a visual target by performing four sequential movements (complex response) or a single movement (simple response) of their middle finger. A visual cue preceded the target by an interval of 300, 1000, or 2000 ms. In Experiment 1, the complex and simple responses were not previously trained. During the testing session, the complex response pattern varied on a trial-by-trial basis following the indication provided by the visual cue. In Experiment 2, the complex response and the simple response were extensively trained beforehand. During the testing session, the trained complex response pattern was performed in all trials. The latency of the untrained and trained complex responses decreased from the short to the medium and long cue-target intervals. The latency of the complex response was longer than that of the simple response, except in the case of the trained responses and the long cue-target interval. These results suggest that the preparation of untrained complex responses cannot be completed in advance, this being possible, however, for trained complex responses when enough time is available. The duration of the 1st submovement, 1st pause and 2nd submovement of the untrained and the trained complex responses increased from the short to the long cue-target interval, suggesting that there is an increase of online programming of the response possibly related to the degree of certainty about the moment of target appearance.

Using Video Game Telemetry Data to Research Motor Chunking, Action Latencies, and Complex Cognitive‐Motor Skill Learning

“…For example, Klapp () found that syllable count was predictive of First‐Action‐Latency in a sentence production task, but only if participants are not given the sentence to be performed in advance. Furthermore, Alouche, Sant'Anna, Biagioni, and Ribeiro‐do‐Valle () got different results by manipulating the duration of the planning phase (when participants have been informed of the sequence to be produced but have not been given the signal to begin sequence production). They found that the effect of Action‐Count on First‐Action‐Latency was more pronounced when planning was short (e.g., 300 ms).…”

Development of a Comprehensive Outcome Measure for Motor Coordination; Step 1: Three-Phase Content Validity Process

“…Tests were selected that assessed single-joint, multijoint, and/or multi-effector discrete, serial or rhythmical movements with different degrees of cognitive demands, without the use of specialized equipment or instrumentation. For example, discrete movements have distinct temporal characteristics (ie, longer reaction and movement times) then serial movements 24 and activate different brain areas such as frontal lobes, cerebellum, and basal ganglia, compared with rhythmical, 25,26 bilateral, 27 or multi-effector movements. 28 Tests were included if quantitative and qualitative assessment in both temporal and spatial domains would be possible using observational kinematics.…”

The bottleneck of the psychological refractory period effect involves timing of response initiation rather than response selection

“…Whereas the study time approach involves a participantdetermined foreperiod duration, another demonstration of the distribution of programming between foreperiod and RT involved varying the duration of the foreperiod experimentally (Alouche, Sant'Anna, Biagioni, & Ribeiro-do-Valle, 2012). Simple RT increased strongly as a function of the number of chunks in the response if the foreperiod was short (300 ms), but this relation became weaker as the foreperiod was increased (1,000 or 2,000 ms).…”