Chapter 1: The Classification of Motor Skills

Vocabulary flashcards focusing on motor skill classifications, definitions, and Gentile's Taxonomy from Chapter 1.

Motor Learning

The study of movement focusing on the acquisition of new skills, performance enhancement of well-learned skills, and reacquisition of skills following injury or disease.

Motor Control

The study of how the neuromuscular system functions to enable coordinated movement while learning a new skill and performing a well-learned skill.

Motor Development

The study of human development from infancy to old age regarding issues related to motor control and learning.

Factors Influencing Motor Skill Performance

The three interacting components that influence motor skill learning and performance: The Person, The Skill, and the Performance Environment.

Movement

Behavioral characteristics of the head, body, and/or a specific limb or combination of limbs.

Motor Skill

An action or task that requires body, head, and/or limb movement to achieve its goal.

Gross Motor Skills

Motor skills that require the use of large musculature to achieve the goal of the skill, such as walking or jumping.

Fine Motor Skills

Motor skills that require control of small muscles to achieve the goal of the skill, such as skills involving hand-eye coordination.

Continuous Motor Skills

Motor skills with no definite beginning or end, such as riding a bicycle.

Discrete Motor Skills

Motor skills with a specified and definite start and end point, such as pressing a button or flipping a light switch.

Serial Motor Skills

Sequential motor skills with a pattern comprising a series of discrete movements with definite start and end points, such as shifting manual gears.

Closed Motor Skills

Motor skills performed in an environment with a stationary supporting surface, object, and/or other people, where the performer determines when to begin the action.

Open Motor Skills

Motor skills performed in an environment where supporting surfaces, objects, or people are in motion, and environmental features determine when to begin the action.

Taxonomy

A classification system organized according to relationships among the component characteristics of what is being classified.

Regulatory Conditions

Characteristics of the environmental context that directly determine or control the movement characteristics of an action.

Intertrial Variability

A characteristic of environmental context in Gentile's taxonomy referring to whether regulatory conditions are the same or different from one performance attempt to another.

Body Stability

A body orientation dimension in Gentile's taxonomy where the skill requires the person to maintain the same location.

Body Transport

A body orientation dimension in Gentile's taxonomy where the skill requires changing location actively or passively.

Object Manipulation

An action function characteristic in Gentile's taxonomy referring to whether an action results in changing the position of an object.