Learning "what" and "how" in a human motor task.

Abstract

We studied the development of implicit and of verbally declared knowledge for normal human subjects who learned an unfamiliar motor task in one learning session. The exploratory nature of motor learning and a special period for optimizing skill were followed in real time. Subjects understood the goal for task success, but they had to learn a motor strategy of what pattern of serial movements to make and the tactics of bow much to scale their amplitudes and timing. We compared the time course for acquiring tactical skill with that for acquiring knowledge of strategy and of tactics, and their necessary cues. Implicit and declarative knowledge were distinguished from one another by correlating subjects' verbal self-reports with movement kinematics and their results. Implicit generation of the correct strategy and of the tactics developed in an exploratory manner from the beginning of the learning session. Implicit strategy learning soon gave way to conscious efforts, but tactical learn.ing remained implicit until its first unambiguous verbal declaration 5Corresponding author.(with one exception). First strategy declarations were voiced before those for tactics, during trial-and-error learning that did not require task success, and referred to reversing the direction of hand movements (one exception). In contrast, first declarations of tactics almost always required actual or imminent success, referred to when direction was to be reversed, and it was achieved near the top of a sigmoid learning curve that rose to tactical skill (with one exception). During the sigmoid rise, movement amplitudes and timing were optimized in a distinct manner, although tactics usually adapted thereafter to movements of more moderate speed that could still be successful.

Eye–Hand Coordination during Learning of a Novel Visuomotor Task

“…We presume that during the exploratory stage, subjects attempt to learn this novel mapping by actively exploring the degrees of freedom of the task in an attempt to discriminate between effective and ineffective strategies (Fitts and Posner, 1967;Brooks et al, 1995). Pursuing the cursor with gaze may assist in learning the mapping between manual actions and cursor movement in several possible ways.…”

“…2 B, left) (cf. Brooks et al, 1995) and no obvious skill refinement stage in two sessions (performed by one subject) ( Fig. 2 B, right).…”

“…During the early stage of motor skill learning, performance of an unfamiliar task is usually uncoordinated and requires considerable effort in making decisions and executing movements (Fitts and Posner, 1967;Brooks et al, 1995;Willingham, 1998). In this early stage, during which actions may not be able to be controlled as to achieve sensory goals or improve performance, the learner attempts to discover the basic mapping rules relating motor and sensory signals before they can be implemented so as to improve performance.…”

Contributions of Spatial Working Memory to Visuomotor Learning

“…It is characterized by at least two stages: an initial learning stage ("fast/early learning") in which withinsession improvements can be induced through a limited number of trials on a time scale of minutes Brooks et al, 1983Brooks et al, , 1995Puttemans et al, 2005;Schmidt, 1976;Smith et al, 2006;Willingham, 1998), and a "slow/late learning" stage, where improvement occurs in a more incremental fashion over hours or even days of practice Willingham, 1998). In general, the early learning stage is described as being cognitively demanding, while the late learning stage is described as being more autonomous .…”

PbD: Visual Guidance for Robot-Arm Manipulation

“…The progress in learning of new tricks (eye-hand coordination and visual-motor task) is affected by two complementary factors: success and failure as indicated by Leibowitch with colleagues (2010) and in other related research [1][2][3][4]. In general, they was demonstrated that the learning function of the trainee performance exhibits a sigmoid behavior when the successful trials/events gradually overcome and dominate over failed attempts.…”