Implicit motor sequence learning in schizophrenia and in old age: reduced performance only in the third session

Cornelis, Claudia; Picker, Livia De; Boer, P. de; Dumont, Glenn; Coppens, Violette; Morsel, Anne; Janssens, Luc; Timmers, Maarten; Sabbe, Bernard; Morrens, Manuel; Hulstijn, Wouter

doi:10.1007/s00221-016-4751-0

Cited by 4 publications

(9 citation statements)

References 42 publications

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“…This could indicate that motor memories are either robust, less susceptible to interference or more efficiently retrieved in our old participants (Brashers-Krug et al, 1996). Nevertheless, the improved consolidation we observed in the old group was unexpected because studies generally report either reduced (relative to young subjects) or complete absence of performance improvement during retesting of motor sequence tasks in older adults (Brown et al, 2009;King et al, 2013;Cornelis et al, 2016;Meissner et al, 2016). Late improvement (after 12 or 24-h off-line period) of GMS was also reported in elderly individuals (Brown et al, 2009;Nemeth and Janacsek, 2011).…”

Section: Effect Of Tacs On Gms Consolidationmentioning

confidence: 76%

Age-Dependent Effect of Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation on Motor Skill Consolidation

Fresnoza

Christova

Bieler

et al. 2020

Front. Aging Neurosci.

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Transcranial alternating current stimulation (tACS) is the application of subthreshold, sinusoidal current to modulate ongoing brain rhythms related to sensory, motor and cognitive processes. Electrophysiological studies suggested that the effect of tACS applied at an alpha frequency (8-12 Hz) was state-dependent. The effects of tACS, that is, an increase in parieto-occipital electroencephalography (EEG) alpha power and magnetoencephalography (MEG) phase coherence, was only observed when the eyes were open (low alpha power) and not when the eyes were closed (high alpha power). This state-dependency of the effects of alpha tACS might extend to the aging brain characterized by general slowing and decrease in spectral power of the alpha rhythm. We additionally hypothesized that tACS will influence the motor cortex, which is involved in motor skill learning and consolidation. A group of young and old healthy adults performed a serial reaction time task (SRTT) with their right hand before and after the tACS stimulation. Each participant underwent three sessions of stimulation: sham, stimulation applied at the individual participant's alpha peak frequency or individual alpha peak frequency (iAPF; α-tACS) and stimulation with iAPF plus 2 Hz (α2-tACS) to the left motor cortex for 10 min (1.5 mA). We measured the effect of stimulation on general motor skill (GMS) and sequence-specific skill (SS) consolidation. We found that α-tACS and α2-tACS improved GMS and SS consolidation in the old group. In contrast, α-tACS minimally improved GMS consolidation but impaired SS consolidation in the young group. On the other hand, α2-tACS was detrimental to the consolidation of both skills in the young group. Our results suggest that individuals with aberrant alpha rhythm such as the elderly could benefit more from tACS stimulation, whereas for young healthy individuals with intact alpha rhythm the stimulation could be detrimental.

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Section: Effect Of Tacs On Gms Consolidationmentioning

confidence: 76%

Age-Dependent Effect of Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation on Motor Skill Consolidation

Fresnoza

Christova

Bieler

et al. 2020

Front. Aging Neurosci.

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“…Elderly participants demonstrated intact motor learning on simple tasks, such as the SAT. This is supported by intact motor learning on the random blocks of the IPLT (Cornelis et al 2016 ). These tasks were simple in that only one short, fast, straight movement was required towards a clearly visible target.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 91%

“…This is in contrast with the reduced performance in the CVLT, a cognitive learning task, where individuals with schizophrenia performed worse than both controls and the elderly, highlighting their cognitive difficulties. Manifestations of a cognitive deficit interfering with motor learning tasks were observed in the implicit sequence learning task, in which subjective sequence awareness arose significantly less (Cornelis et al 2016 ). Therefore, it can be suggested that individuals with schizophrenia are impaired on sensorimotor learning paradigms in which explicit cognitive processes play a role.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Motor learning and performance in schizophrenia and aging: two different patterns of decline

Hulstijn,

Cornelis,

Morsel

et al. 2024

Exp Brain Res

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Psychomotor slowing has consistently been observed in schizophrenia, however research on motor learning in schizophrenia is limited. Additionally, motor learning in schizophrenia has never been compared with the waning of motor learning abilities in the elderly. Therefore, in an extensive study, 30 individuals with schizophrenia, 30 healthy age-matched controls and 30 elderly participants were compared on sensorimotor learning tasks including sequence learning and adaptation (both explicit and implicit), as well as tracking and aiming. This paper presents new findings on an explicit motor sequence learning task, an explicit verbal learning task and a simple aiming task and summarizes all previously published findings of this large investigation. Individuals with schizophrenia and elderly had slower Movement Time (MT)s compared with controls in all tasks, however both groups improved over time. Elderly participants learned slower on tracking and explicit sequence learning while individuals with schizophrenia adapted slower and to a lesser extent to movement perturbations in adaptation tasks and performed less well on cognitive tests including the verbal learning task. Results suggest that motor slowing is present in schizophrenia and the elderly, however both groups show significant but different motor skill learning. Cognitive deficits seem to interfere with motor learning and performance in schizophrenia while task complexity and decreased movement precision interferes with motor learning in the elderly, reflecting different underlying patterns of decline in these conditions. In addition, evidence for motor slowing together with impaired implicit adaptation supports the influence of cerebellum and the cerebello-thalamo-cortical-cerebellar (CTCC) circuits in schizophrenia, important for further understanding the pathophysiology of the disorder.

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“…The currently presented data are part of a larger study in which the same participants were tested on a large range of sensorimotor learning tasks. In a motor sequence learning task, patients with schizophrenia demonstrated a minor reduction in learning, which became apparent only after extensive training and could be attributed to a deficit in explicit learning [53]. In two other tasks investigating implicit learning, a sensorimotor speed task [54] and a rotary pursuit task [55], preserved implicit learning in schizophrenia was demonstrated.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Impaired Sensorimotor Adaption in Schizophrenia in Comparison to Age-Matched and Elderly Controls

et al. 2021

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Background: The “cognitive dysmetria hypothesis” of schizophrenia proposes a disrupted communication between the cerebellum and cerebral cortex, resulting in sensorimotor and cognitive symptoms. Sensorimotor adaptation relies strongly on the function of the cerebellum. Objectives: This study investigated whether sensorimotor adaptation is reduced in schizophrenia compared with age-matched and elderly healthy controls. Methods: Twenty-nine stably treated patients with schizophrenia, 30 age-matched, and 30 elderly controls were tested in three motor adaptation tasks in which visual movement feedback was unexpectedly altered. In the “rotation adaptation task” the perturbation consisted of a rotation (30° clockwise), in the “gain adaptation task” the extent of the movement feedback was reduced (by a factor of 0.7) and in the “vertical reversal task,” up- and downward pen movements were reversed by 180°. Results: Patients with schizophrenia adapted to the perturbations, but their movement times and errors were substantially larger than controls. Unexpectedly, the magnitude of adaptation was significantly smaller in schizophrenia than elderly participants. The impairment already occurred during the first adaptation trials, pointing to a decline in explicit strategy use. Additionally, post-adaptation aftereffects provided strong evidence for impaired implicit adaptation learning. Both negative and positive schizophrenia symptom severities were correlated with indices of the amount of adaptation and its aftereffects. Conclusions: Both explicit and implicit components of sensorimotor adaptation learning were reduced in patients with schizophrenia, adding to the evidence for a role of the cerebellum in the pathophysiology of schizophrenia. Elderly individuals outperformed schizophrenia patients in the adaptation learning tasks.

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Implicit motor sequence learning in schizophrenia and in old age: reduced performance only in the third session

Cited by 4 publications

References 42 publications

Age-Dependent Effect of Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation on Motor Skill Consolidation

Age-Dependent Effect of Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation on Motor Skill Consolidation

Motor learning and performance in schizophrenia and aging: two different patterns of decline

Impaired Sensorimotor Adaption in Schizophrenia in Comparison to Age-Matched and Elderly Controls

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