Multiple-task transfer effects in perceptual-motor learning.
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Physical fatigue and motor learning.
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Adult↗
Motor learning characteristics of low-skilled college men.
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Learning↗
Factors affecting motor learning.
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Animals↗
Role of practice in perceptual-motor learning.
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Humans↗
Changes in pelvic floor and diaphragm kinematics and respiratory patterns in subjects with sacroiliac joint pain following a motor learning intervention: a case series.
This study was a case series design. The objectives of the study were to investigate the ability of a motor learning intervention to change aberrant pelvic floor and diaphragm kinematics and respiratory patterns observed in subjects with sacroiliac joint pain (SIJP) during the active straight leg raise (ASLR) test. The ASLR test is a valid and reliable tool to assist in the assessment of load transference through the pelvis. Irregular respiratory patterns, decreased diaphragmatic excursion and descent of the pelvic floor have been reported in subjects with SIJP during this test. To date the ability to alter these patterns has not been determined. Respiratory patterns, kinematics of the diaphragm and pelvic floor during the ASLR test and the ability to consciously elevate the pelvic floor in conjunction with changes in pain and disability levels were assessed in nine subjects with a clinical diagnosis of SIJP. Each subject then undertook an individualized motor learning intervention. The initial variables were then reassessed. Results showed that abnormal kinematics of the diaphragm and pelvic floor during the ASLR improved following intervention. Respiratory patterns were also influenced in a positive manner. An inability to consciously elevate the pelvic floor pre-treatment was reversed. These changes were associated with improvement in pain and disability scores. This study provides preliminary evidence that aberrant motor control strategies in subjects with SIJP during the ASLR can be enhanced with a motor learning intervention. Positive changes in motor control were associated with improvements in pain and disability. Randomized controlled research is required to validate these results.
Adult↗
The implementation of motor learning principles in designing prevention programs at work.
Occupational therapy practitioners offer services to workers in the workplace to prevent musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs), to help the injured worker restore function, and to recover capacities needed to return to the job. Despite the existence of some evidence about the efficacy of prevention programs, there is uncertainty and even disagreement among health professionals, about the outcome of prevention programs for people with MSDs. It is proposed that principles of motor learning can assist the therapist in structuring prevention programs to facilitate the workers learning of correct movement patterns. This paper discusses basic concepts of motor learning emphasizing characteristics of the learner, the type of task, the structure of practice and application to prevention programs at work settings. We present a four-stage model for prevention programs based on principles of both motor learning and ergonomics. This model coincides with the broad perspective suggested in current occupational therapy models which focuses on the person, the environment, the occupation and their effects on occupational performance.
Adult↗
Physiological properties of vestibular primary afferents that mediate motor learning and normal performance of the vestibulo-ocular reflex in monkeys.
We have used electrical stimulation of the vestibular apparatus to reveal parallels between the physiological responses of the vestibular afferents activated at different currents and the properties of the evoked eye movements before and after magnifying spectacles had been used to cause motor learning in the vestibulo-ocular reflex (VOR). Stimulation with the lowest currents caused little or no eye motion, but activated all the afferents with irregular spontaneous discharge, low sensitivities to head velocity, and highly phasic responses during rapid head turns. Stimulation with moderate currents caused substantial eye motion that was weakly affected by motor learning; these currents activated afferents with a wide range of physiological properties, including many that had intermediate discharge regularity, high sensitivity to head velocity, and clear phasic responses during rapid head turns. Stimulation at still higher currents caused still larger eye movements that were strongly altered by motor learning; these currents activated primarily afferents that had regular spontaneous discharge, lower sensitivities to head velocity, and tonic responses during rapid head turns. Stimulation at the highest currents did not cause any further increment in the amplitude of the evoked eye movement, but activated the afferents with the most regular spontaneous discharge and the lowest sensitivities to head velocity. The data imply that the VOR pathways receive substantial vestibular inputs from afferents with a middle range of thresholds for electrical stimulation. These afferents have a wide range of physiological properties, including a large group that shows substantial phasic responses during rapid head turns. The data also suggest that only a subset of these afferents, primarily those with more regular spontaneous discharge, project into the VOR pathways that are modified in association with motor learning.
Afferent Pathways↗
Premotor cortex and conditional motor learning in man.
The role of premotor cortex (PMC) in conditional motor learning tasks in man was investigated. Patients with PMC lesions had to learn to associate 6 different visual, tactile or auditory stimuli with 6 different arm movements which were previously rehearsed (Task A). A comparative task involved an association between the same set of sensory stimuli and 6 spatial locations (Task B). Patients with PMC lesions were only impaired when they had to recall a movement from memory on the basis of a sensory cue (Task A), but not for an association involving spatial location (Task B). This indicates that the PMC plays a role in sensory conditional motor learning.
Adult↗
Implicit motor learning deficits in dyslexic adults.
Children with developmental dyslexia fail to develop age-appropriate reading skills despite adequate intelligence and education. It has been suggested that dyslexics' various literacy, sensory and motor difficulties may be related to impaired cerebellar function. As the cerebellum is involved in motor learning, we measured serial reaction time performance in 40 adults (21 controls, 19 dyslexics). Dyslexic subjects performed comparably to controls during the randomly-ordered reaction time blocks, indicating that the dyslexics were as able as controls to make appropriate stimulus-response associations. However, the dyslexics failed to show the reaction time reduction that the control group showed during the repeated sequences (p = 0.018) and there was a significant group by condition effect when comparing the last two blocks of the sequence condition with the first two blocks of the final random condition (p = 0.008). Furthermore, there was a significant difference between good and poor readers on the degree of learning during the task (p = 0.015). This suggests that some dyslexics may suffer from an implicit motor learning deficit, which could generalize to non-motor learning.
Adult↗
Procedural motor learning in Parkinson's disease.
We have been investigating motor control and learning in parkinsonian subjects. In the current study, we sought to explore the existence of deficits in procedural motor learning, which is a form of implicit motor learning where skill improves over repetitive blocks of trials. We sought to determine, in particular, whether any such deficit is accentuated during specific types or phases of learning. We would expect that those specific learning tasks would require the greatest participation of the basal ganglia. Numerous studies have found that Parkinson's disease (PD) patients may show deficits in learning. Combined with information about basal ganglia neuronal connections and activity, this led some investigators to suggest that one of the key functions of the basal ganglia is to facilitate learning. To investigate these learning deficits, we used a robotic device to generate conservative force fields that disturbed the subjects' arm movements, thereby generating a "virtual mechanical environment" that subjects learned to manipulate. Movements were successively grouped into blocks comprising five different conditions: motor performance, early learning, late learning, negative transfer, and aftereffect motor performance. Our results with eight right-handed PD subjects and nine age-matched controls showed a relative decrease in the rate of learning for the PD patients in all blocks, but greater differences emerged between groups during novelty phases of learning. In particular, the difference in performance during the negative transfer condition reached statistical significance, suggesting that the basal ganglia might be a key center for "switching" motor patterns. Our results support the hypothesis that deficiencies in procedural motor learning are characteristic of PD. They add to existing evidence which has suggested a key role for the basal ganglia when new sensorimotor mappings are required by novel task environments. Better understanding of these deficits should facilitate the rehabilitation of PD patients.
Aged↗
On the cerebellum and motor learning.
A critical review of the role of the cerebellum in motor learning is presented. Specifically, the hypothesis that the climbing fibers that issue from the inferior olive serve to modify the responsiveness of cerebellar Purkinje cells is evaluated. It is concluded that there is no convincing evidence, at this time, to support the view that a long-term modification of Purkinje cell activity is either the basis of motor learning or an authentic mechanism of cerebellar function. An alternative view, based on the biophysical, anatomical and ensemble properties of olivary neurons, suggests an important role for the olivocerebellar system in the coordination of movements. Future work in this interesting area of neuroscience will distinguish these two hypotheses.
Animals↗
How does the limbic system assist motor learning? A limbic comparator hypothesis.
This paper offers a new hypothesis about how the limbic system might assist motor learning. It is proposed that interactions of limbic and sensorimotor-related systems are essential for learning what to do in a motor task (appropriate, relevant behavior) and how to do it best (motor skill). Limbic modulations of sensorimotor-related neural centers are envisaged to result from comparisons in various neural centers of converging inputs from the relevance-sensitive amygdala and from corollary, cortically-modulated recipients of amygdaloid information. Such comparisons of relatively 'raw' limbic inputs and their 'processed', corollary forms could be achieved in a side-loop manner resembling that in the cerebellum. This 'limbic comparator' hypothesis was prompted by studies of motor learning that show how monkeys develop skill only after gaining insight into appropriate, task-related behavior, and that inappropriate behavior during transition into the insightful state produces 'error' signals from the anterior cingulate cortex. Known sites of limbic projections that could serve corollary comparisons are examined with regard to their possible influence on motivation, appropriate, task-related behavior and motor skill. Anatomical and functional tests of convergence and comparison in sensorimotor-related neural centers are suggested in order to stimulate investigations of the limbic comparator hypothesis.
Animals↗
Motor-learning-related changes in piano players and non-musicians revealed by functional magnetic-resonance signals.
In this study, we investigated blood-flow-related magnetic-resonance (MR) signal changes and the time course underlying short-term motor learning of the dominant right hand in ten piano players (PPs) and 23 non-musicians (NMs), using a complex finger-tapping task. The activation patterns were analyzed for selected regions of interest (ROIs) within the two examined groups and were related to the subjects' performance. A functional learning profile, based on the regional blood-oxygenation-level-dependent (BOLD) signal changes, was assessed in both groups. All subjects achieved significant increases in tapping frequency during the training session of 35 min in the scanner. PPs, however, performed significantly better than NMs and showed increasing activation in the contralateral primary motor cortex throughout motor learning in the scanner. At the same time, involvement of secondary motor areas, such as bilateral supplementary motor area, premotor, and cerebellar areas, diminished relative to the NMs throughout the training session. Extended activation of primary and secondary motor areas in the initial training stage (7-14 min) and rapid attenuation were the main functional patterns underlying short-term learning in the NM group; attenuation was particularly marked in the primary motor cortices as compared with the PPs. When tapping of the rehearsed sequence was performed with the left hand, transfer effects of motor learning were evident in both groups. Involvement of all relevant motor components was smaller than after initial training with the right hand. Ipsilateral premotor and primary motor contributions, however, showed slight increases of activation, indicating that dominant cortices influence complex sequence learning of the non-dominant hand. In summary, the involvement of primary and secondary motor cortices in motor learning is dependent on experience. Interhemispheric transfer effects are present.
Adult↗
Qualitative and quantitative change in the dynamics of motor learning.
The experiments examined qualitative and quantitative changes in the dynamics of learning a novel motor skill (roller ball task) as a function of the manipulation of a control parameter (initial ball speed). The focus was on the relation between the rates of change in performance over practice time and the changing time scales of the evolving attractor dynamic. Results showed 3 different learning patterns to the changes in the dynamics as a function of practice that were mediated by the initial ball speed. Only participants who learned the task showed a bifurcation in coordination mode that was preceded by enhanced performance variability. The observed multiple time scales to motor learning are interpreted as the products of the dynamical stability and instability realized from (a) the continually evolving landscape dynamics due to bifurcations between attractor organization and (b) the transient phenomena associated with moving toward and away from fixed-point dynamics.
Adult↗
Systemic harmaline blocks associative and motor learning by the actions of the inferior olive.
Is there a role for the inferior olive in learning? Novel paradigms of conditioning involving tongue protrusion were developed using the rat to test whether: (a) the indole alkaloid harmaline blocks associative learning via actions within the inferior olive, and (b) the inferior olive is required for associative and motor learning. Harmaline blocked associative learning as measured by the absence of conditioned responses to a tone over six daily sessions of conditioning and the absence of retention without harmaline. Harmaline's effect on associative learning was completely blocked by prior removal of the inferior olive with 3-acetylpyridine. Rats whose inferior olives were chronically lesioned showed normal associative learning, normal associative memory, and could learn to modify tongue protrusion via a motor learning paradigm involving response shaping. Removal of the inferior olive degraded the performance of the licking motor system by increasing the latency of conditioned tongue protrusions and by increasing the temporal variability of rhythmic licking elicited by intraoral water. The experiments raise doubt as to whether the inferior olive encodes memory in the cerebellum but demonstrate that the inferior olive is essential for the temporal precision of movement. The results indicate that harmaline's antilearning action is produced by its ability to exaggerate the normal propensity of olivary neurons to fire rhythmically, a process that must be constrained under physiological conditions for normal learning to occur. It is concluded that there may be an important role for the rhythmic activity of inferior olivary neurons in the temporal processes that underlie both motor control and learning.
Animals↗
Influence of the inter-reach-interval on motor learning.
Previous studies have demonstrated changes in motor memories with the passage of time on the order of hours. We sought to further this work by determining the influence that time on the order of seconds has on motor learning by changing the duration between successive reaches (inter-reach-interval (IRI)). Human subjects made reaching movements to visual targets while holding onto a robotic manipulandum that presented a viscous curl field. We tested four experimental groups that differed with respect to the IRI (0.5, 5, 10 or 20 s). The 0.5 s IRI group performed significantly worse with respect to a learning index than the other groups over the first set of 192 reaches. Each group demonstrated significant learning during the first set. There was no significant difference with respect to the learning index between the 5, 10 and 20 s IRI groups. During the second and third set of 192 reaches the 0.5 s IRI group's performance became indistinguishable from the other groups indicating that with continued training the initial deficit in performance could be overcome.
Adult↗
Normal motor learning during pharmacological prevention of Purkinje cell long-term depression.
Systemic delivery of (1R-1-benzo thiophen-5-yl-2[2-diethylamino)-ethoxy] ethanol hydrochloride (T-588) prevented long-term depression (LTD) of the parallel fiber (PF)-Purkinje cell (PC) synapse induced by conjunctive climbing fiber and PF stimulation in vivo. However, similar concentrations of T-588 in the brains of behaving mice and rats affected neither motor learning in the rotorod test nor the learning of motor timing during classical conditioning of the eyeblink reflex. Rats given doses of T-588 that prevented PF-PC LTD were as proficient as controls in learning to adapt the timing of their conditioned eyeblink response to a 150- or 350-ms change in the timing of the paradigm. The experiment indicates that PF-PC LTD under control of the climbing fibers is not required for general motor adaptation or the learning of response timing in two common models of motor learning for which the cerebellum has been implicated. Alternative mechanisms for motor timing and possible functions for LTD in protection from excitotoxicity are discussed.
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