Motor learning without movement

Kim, Olivia A.; Forrence, Alexander D; McDougle, Samuel D.

doi:10.1101/2021.08.12.456140

Cited by 5 publications

(2 citation statements)

References 98 publications

(214 reference statements)

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“…In conclusion, the results from this study show that sensorimotor adaptation to target errors is possible in an online Pong game. It supports the findings of previous studies demonstrating that online experimentation can be as informative if not more than traditional laboratory experiments (Kim et al, 2021; Tsay et al, 2021). The Pong task is less restrictive than the ones that have been used in past lab-based studies.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Rapid motor adaptation to bounce perturbations in online Pong game is independent from the visual tilt of the bouncing surface

Mikula

Hart

Henriques

2022

Preprint

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Motor adaptation describes the ability of the motor system to counteract repeated perturbations in order to reduce movement errors. Most research in the field investigated adaptation in response to perturbations affecting the moving hand. Fewer studies looked at the effect of a perturbation applied to the movement target, however they used simplistic visual stimuli. In this study, we examined motor adaptation to perturbations affecting the motion of dynamic targets. In addition, we asked whether external visual cues in the environment could facilitate this process. To do so, participants were asked to play an online version of the Pong game in which they intercepted a ball bouncing off a wall using a paddle. A perturbation was applied to alter the post-bounce trajectory of the ball and the wall orientation was manipulated to be consistent or not with the ball trajectory. The "trained tilt" group (n = 34) adapted to the consistent condition and the "trained horizontal" group (n = 36) adapted to the inconsistent condition. In case participants optimally integrate external visual cues, the "trained tilt" group is expected to exhibit faster and/or more complete adaptation than the "trained horizontal" group. We found that the perturbation reduced interception accuracy. Participants showed large interception errors when the perturbation was introduced, followed by rapid error decrease and aftereffects (errors in the opposite direction) once the perturbation was removed. Although both experimental groups showed these typical markers of motor adaptation, we did not find differences in interception success rates or errors between the "trained tilt" and "trained horizontal" groups. Our results demonstrate that participants quickly adapted to the dynamics of the pong ball. However, the visual tilt of the bouncing surface did not enhance their performance. The present study highlights the ability of the motor system to adapt to external perturbations applied to a moving target in a more dynamical environment and in online settings. These findings underline the prospects of further research on sensorimotor adaptation to unexpected changes in the environment using more naturalistic and complex real-world or virtual reality tasks as well as gamified paradigms.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

Rapid motor adaptation to bounce perturbations in online Pong game is independent from the visual tilt of the bouncing surface

Mikula

Hart

Henriques

2022

Preprint

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“…Sheahan and colleagues (33) show that planning without executing different follow-through movements is sufficient for learning opposing perturbations simultaneously. Furthermore, Kim and colleagues (34) have recently shown that motor learning in the context of motor adaptation occurs also if the previous movement is withheld. These observations are in line with studies showing that motor imagery improves performance in sports (35,36).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Even well-practiced movements benefit from repetition

Sutter

Wijdenes

Beers

et al. 2021

Preprint

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Professional golf players spend years practicing, but will still perform one or two practice swings without a ball before executing the actual swing. Why do they do this? In this study we tested the hypothesis that repeating a well-practiced movement leads to a reduction of movement variability. To operationalize this hypothesis, participants were tested in a center-out reaching task with four different targets, on four different days. To probe the effect of repetition they performed random sequences from one to six movements to the same target. Our findings show that, with repetition, movements are not only initiated earlier but their variability is reduced across the entire movement trajectory. Furthermore, this effect is present within and across the four sessions. Together, our results suggest that movement repetition changes the tradeoff between movement initiation and movement precision.

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Motor learning without movement

Kim

Forrence

McDougle

2022

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Prediction errors guide many forms of learning, providing teaching signals that help us improve our performance. Implicit motor adaptation, for instance, is thought to be driven by sensory prediction errors (SPEs), which occur when the expected and observed consequences of a movement differ. Traditionally, SPE computation is thought to require movement execution. However, recent work suggesting that the brain can generate sensory predictions based on motor imagery or planning alone calls this assumption into question. Here, by measuring implicit motor adaptation during a visuomotor task, we tested whether motor planning and well-timed sensory feedback are sufficient for adaptation. Human participants were cued to reach to a target and were, on a subset of trials, rapidly cued to withhold these movements. Errors displayed both on trials with and without movements induced single-trial adaptation. Learning following trials without movements persisted even when movement trials had never been paired with errors and when the direction of movement and sensory feedback trajectories were decoupled. These observations indicate that the brain can compute errors that drive implicit adaptation without generating overt movements, leading to the adaptation of motor commands that are not overtly produced.

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Motor learning without movement

Cited by 5 publications

References 98 publications

Rapid motor adaptation to bounce perturbations in online Pong game is independent from the visual tilt of the bouncing surface

Rapid motor adaptation to bounce perturbations in online Pong game is independent from the visual tilt of the bouncing surface

Even well-practiced movements benefit from repetition

Motor learning without movement

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