Increasing muscle co-contraction speeds up internal model acquisition during dynamic motor learning.

ABSTRACT: During reaching movements in the presence of novel dynamics, participants initially co-contract their muscles to reduce kinematic errors and improve task performance. As learning proceeds, muscle co-contraction decreases as an accurate internal model develops. The initial co-contraction could affect the learning of the internal model in several ways. By ensuring the limb remains close to the target state, co-contraction could speed up learning. Conversely, by reducing kinematic errors, a key training signal, it could slow down learning. Alternatively, given that the effects of muscle co-contraction on kinematic errors are predictable and could be discounted when assessing the internal model error, it could have no effect on learning. Using a sequence of force pulses, we pretrained two grou

SUBMITTER: Heald JB 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6218508 | biostudies-literature | 2018 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature