exsc 351 - exam 1 (all modules)

motor behavior

examines neural, muscular, sensory, biomechanical, and psychological mechanisms that mediate learning and control of motor skills

motor skills

active, intentional movements that are used to achieve task goals

motor learning

examines how motor skills are acquired, refined, retained

motor control

examines how motor skills are planned, initiated, and executed

motor performance

refers to observable movements and outcomes of motor skills

coordination

the patterning of body and limb movements

skill

the quality of movement

ability

general capacity to perform motor skills

one CAN have ability without skill
one CANNOT have skill without ability

true

talent

combination of abilities and skill

mind-body connection

the bidirectional relationship between psychological functions (mind) and physiological functions (body)

efferent

outgoing signals sent to muscles

afferent

incoming signals from the body

role of the brain in mind-body connection

acts as a bidirectional interface between mind and body

ability

general capacity to learn and perform skills

what transforms abilities into motor skills

motor learning

physical abilites

anatomical and physiological abilities

- strength, endurance

psychomotor

perceptual and cognitive abilities

- decision making, dexterity

psychological

behavioral and emotional abilities

- motivation, confidence

talent

combination of motor abilities and skills

talent identification

measures current abilities and skills to predict future performance

two key limitations of talent identification

- difficult to measure abilities

- difficult to identify combinations of motor skills and abilites that will lead to success

importance of classifying motor skills

- compare research
- predict learning and performance
- generalization of research

what classifications of motor skills are based on movement continuity?

-discrete skills
- continuous skills
- serial skills

discrete skills

- single movement
- short duration
- distinct start and end
- throwing, kicking, punching

continuous skills

- repetition of movement
- without a distinct start or end
- cycling, swimming, running

serial skills

- multiple movments
- combine discrete and continuous skills
- gymnastics, typing

what classifications of motor skills are based on movement precision?

fine skills
gross skills

fine skills

- small movements
- typically use small muscles and involve high precision

gross skills

- large movements
- large muscles and low precision

what classifications of motor skills are based on environmental stability?

closed skills
open skills

closed skills

- self initiated skills in a stable (unchanging environment)

(darts)

open skills

initiated in response to changes in the environment

(hitting a moving ball)

practice progression

switching from closed to open environments

Gentile's Taxonomy

combines three different classification schemes

- environment
- body movement
- object interaction

classification of golf

- closed skill
- quasi mobile body
- with object manipulation

classification of tennis

- open skill
- mobile body
- with object manipulation

classification of static stretches

- closed skill
- stable body
- no object manipulation

perception

detection, identification, interpretation of sensory information

- vision, proprioception, auditory

cognition

manipulation, storage, recall of current and prior information

- attention, memory, executive function

action

- integration of perceptual and cognitive information to plan, initiate, and execute motor skills

- movements

multiple resource theory

information processing engages multiple pools of resources

each pool...
- processes different information
- has limited capacity
- shares resources

parallel processing

- multiple at once

used during low demands, leading to good performance

serial processing

- one thing at a time, sequential progression of information

used during high
demands, leading to poor performance

psychological refractory periods

response delays that occur during high demands that require serial processing

memory

repositories that store information

working memory

temporarily stores limited amounts of information

long term memory

permanently stores unlimited amounts of information

procedural memory

stores implicit information about how to perform skills

semantic memory

stores explicit knowledge about what things are

episodic memory

stores explicit information linked to specific events

- when and where
- often linked to emotions

motor memory

information used to perform motor skills

- includes all categories of working and long term memory

why is muscle memory a misleading term?

- its used in place of procedural memory
- muscles cannot store information

attention

allocation of neural resources to process information

- results in focus on information

selective attention

- attention placed on specific information

- attention on task-relevant information

spatial attention

allocate attention to where relevant information is

temporal attention

allocate attention to when relevant information is present

selective attention initially involves _______ allocation of attention and subsequently involves ________ allocation of attention

- initially involves explicit allocation

- subsequently involves implicit allocation

attentional switching

shifting attention to information relevant at different places and times

what facilitates attentional switching

anticipation

- learned through experience

focus of attention

- quality of attention
- where attention is allocated

external focus

allocates attention to informaton in the environment

internal focus

allocates attention in the body or mind

width of attention

how much information is allocated to attention

narrow width of attention

allocated attention to one specific piece of information

broad width of attention

simultaneously allocated attention to several pieces of information

Nideffer's 2D scale

used to classify attention based on focus and width of attention

inattentional (change) blindness

unaware of changes to information due to selective attention on other sources of information

stress

- physiological and psychological responses to changing conditions

- may have positive or negative effect

arousal

psychological response to stress

may have positive or negative effect

anxiety

negative psychological state embodied by sense of worry

negative effect

inverted-u principle

too much or too little arousal will negatively affect motor performance

IZOF model

optimal arousal is specific to individuals but influenced by emotional bearing

negative and positive emotional bearing examples

negative - fear, nervous

positive - enjoyment, satisfaction

motor performance

observable movements and outcomes of motor skills

measures of motor performance

assess quality of movements and outcomes

1. determine strengths and weaknesses

2. compare performance with standard

3. feedback during practice

4. assess improvements

validity

ability to assess intended aspects of motor performance

accuracy

ability to obtain unbiased values

reliability

ability to repeatably obtain the same values

developing quality measures is…

difficult and requires experience

repetitive stepwise testing

used to develop measures with all three properties

1. test for validity

2. test for accuracy and reliability

3. modify the measure and repeat

   - multiple repetitions are often needed to attain all 3 properties

outcome measures

assess the results of movements

provide information related to task goal

production measures

assess how body or limb movements produce motor skills

information on how the body or limbs move

what are production measures used for and how are they obtained?

used to identify targets for interventions in motor learning

obtained from kinematics, kinetics, and EMG

outcome and production measures can assess both spatial and temporal features

True

kinematics

movements produced by the body, limbs, and joints

motion trackers

used to measure limb movements during gait

kinetics

forces produced by the body, limbs, and joints

force transducers

used to measure forces during balance and grasping

electromyography (EMG)

used to record electrical activity of muscles

EMG measures?

how muscle activations produce motor skills

• how groups of muscles work together (intermuscular)

• how individual motor units are recruited (intramuscular)

error measures

assess accuracy and consistency of motor performance, provide feedback during motor learning

constant error

examines accuracy of motor performance

• measures systemic biases (error in particular direction)

• quantifies size and direction of errors

variable error

examines consistency of motor performance

• measures variability

• quantifies dispersion (randomness) of motor performance

absolute error

examines accuracy and consistency of motor performance

• sensitive to both biases and variability

• quantifies average size of errors (no regard for direction)

interpretation of error measures

error measures help us interpret quality of motor performance

which one has a larger constant error? variable error?

A has a larger variable error b/c the shots are less consistent

B has a larger constant error b/c his shots are less accurate to the center

what causes delays and errors in information processing?

processing limitations

• Limited capacity leads to overtaxing of
  available resources in each pool

• Sharing of resources causes interference
  between different pools

how do we measure speed and accuracy of information processing?

• it cannot be directly measures

• inferred from speed and accuracy of responses to sensory stimuli

response time (RpT)

time from stimulus onset to movement end