Relationship between Spectral Characteristics of Spontaneous Postural Sway and Motion Sickness Susceptibility

Abstract

Motion sickness (MS) usually occurs for a narrow band of frequencies of the imposed oscillation. It happens that this frequency band is close to that which are spontaneously produced by postural sway during natural stance. This study examined the relationship between reported susceptibility to motion sickness and postural control. The hypothesis is that the level of MS can be inferred from the shape of the Power Spectral Density (PSD) profile of spontaneous sway, as measured by the displacement of the center of mass during stationary, upright stance. In Experiment 1, postural fluctuations while standing quietly were related to MS history for inertial motion. In Experiment 2, postural stability measures registered before the onset of a visual roll movement were related to MS symptoms following the visual stimulation. Study of spectral characteristics in postural control showed differences in the distribution of energy along the power spectrum of the antero-posterior sway signal. Participants with MS history provoked by exposure to inertial motion showed a stronger contribution of the high frequency components of the sway signal. When MS was visually triggered, sick participants showed more postural sway in the low frequency range. The results suggest that subject-specific PSD details may be a predictor of the MS level. Furthermore, the analysis of the sway frequency spectrum provided insight into the intersubject differences in the use of postural control subsystems. The relationship observed between MS susceptibility and spontaneous posture is discussed in terms of postural sensory weighting and in relation to the nature of the provocative stimulus.

Postural instability in an immersive Virtual Reality adapts with repetition and includes directional and gender specific effects

“…Interestingly, the low frequency lateral energy used in VR showed lower postural adaptation between sessions, which is in line with the theory that provocative visual motion produces low frequency postural oscillations 26 . Imposed accelerations above 0.2 Hz are usually perceived as one translating through space, whereas accelerations below 0.2 Hz are usually perceived as a change in the direction of the gravito-inertial acceleration vector i.e., a tilt with respect to the gravitational vertical, which may explain the directional effect in terms of lateral sway 6 . However, our findings are not consistent enough to support the hypothesis that subjects less resilient to VR display more low frequency postural movements when standing upright 6 .…”

“…Imposed accelerations above 0.2 Hz are usually perceived as one translating through space, whereas accelerations below 0.2 Hz are usually perceived as a change in the direction of the gravito-inertial acceleration vector i.e., a tilt with respect to the gravitational vertical, which may explain the directional effect in terms of lateral sway 6 . However, our findings are not consistent enough to support the hypothesis that subjects less resilient to VR display more low frequency postural movements when standing upright 6 . Moreover, the stability issues and gender differences were primarily reflected by a higher level and poorer adaption of the high frequency postural sway.…”

“…Interestingly, adaptive postural skills to sensory conflicts are reduced in individuals susceptible to motion sickness, specifically seasickness. Previous investigations have shown that seasick individuals experience higher levels of low frequency postural movements when standing upright 6 , especially in the lateral plane 7,8 . As visual motion is a particularly provocative and reliable stimulus for motion sickness, we wanted to test whether low and high frequency postural responses adapt during quiet stance in a provocative VR environment.…”

Toward Predicting Motion Sickness Using Virtual Reality and a Moving Platform Assessing Brain, Muscles, and Heart Signals

“… Koohestani et al (2019) give an overview of objective biosignal measures in MS research. Objective kinematic measures such as center of pressure (COP) are also documented as having relationships to MS levels in the literature ( Thurrell and Bronstein, 2002 ; Weech et al, 2018 ) as well as spectral characteristics of spontaneous sway, which have been measured as a possible objective measurement for a predictive MS parameter Laboissière et al (2015) .…”

A data set with kinematic and ground reaction forces of human balance

“…There are already a few data sets of this nature available in the literature, but these data sets contain limited data. The available data sets include: measurements of the displacement of a marker at a subject’s shoulder (as an estimation of whole body postural sway) for 27 subjects during quiet standing, which originated from a study about the effects of vibration on human balance ( Priplata et al, 2003 ); measurements of the COP position of 38 subjects during quiet standing, which originated from a study about the effects of different types of visual stimuli on human balance ( Perakakis et al, 2012 ); measurements of the COP position of 43 subjects during quiet standing, which originated from a study about the relationship between postural sway and motion sickness ( Laboissiere et al, 2015 ); and measurements of the COP position of nine subjects during quiet standing, which originated from a study about human postural control ( Funato et al, 2016 ). All these data sets contain companion data of studies that investigated a specific research question, so these data sets naturally have limited value for use in studies on different topics.…”