Does practicing a wide range of joint angle configurations lead to higher flexibility in a manual obstacle-avoidance target-pointing task?

ABSTRACT: Flexibility in motor actions can be defined as variability in the use of degrees of freedom (e.g., joint angles in the arm) over repetitions while keeping performance (e.g., fingertip position) stabilized. We examined whether flexibility can be increased through enlarging the joint angle range during practice in a manual obstacle-avoidance target-pointing task. To establish differences in flexibility we partitioned the variability in joint angles over repetitions in variability within (GEV) and variability outside the solution space (NGEV). More GEV than NGEV reflects flexibility; when the ratio of the GEV and NGEV is higher, flexibility is higher. The pretest and posttest consisted of 30 repetitions of manual pointing to a target while moving over a 10 cm high obstacle. To enlarge the joi

SUBMITTER: Tuitert I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5507288 | biostudies-literature | 2017

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature