Sensory-based mechanism for delayed motor intention

Prospective motor learning (PML) can be defined as learning an action to be performed in the future. The privileged retrieval mechanism behind this delayed motor performance remains unknown. From a motor control and learning perspective, we may conceive of two forms of retrieval: a stimulus- and an intention-based control. Retrieval from intention-based control is based on the anticipation of intended sensory effects related to an action in order to select and control the appropriate motor procedure (i.e., the ideomotor mechanism). In contrast, in a stimulus-based control a connection between stimuli-features and their related action-features is stored in the memory and serves as the retrieval mechanism. In this view, action retrieval from external stimuli is based on the detection of events in the environment to perform the intended behaviour (i.e., the sensorimotor mechanism). In this study, we report an advantage in the action retrieval for participants who use an intention-based mode of control in comparison to a stimulus-based control. Furthermore, a control task reveals that the intention-based advantage is specific to PML. Our findings show that PML is benefited by mental anticipation of a sensory effect that is efficiently processed through an ideomotor mechanism to fulfil delayed motor intentions.     

Lexical,conceptual and motor information in memory for action phrases: a multi-system account

According to the multi-system account [J. Engelkamp, H.D. Zimmer, The Human Memory: A Multi-Modal Approach, Hogrefe & Huber, Seattle, 1994], the enactment effect in free recall of action phrases (e.g. break the stick) is independent of inter- and intra-phrase associations because it emerges from the nonverbal encoding processes under enactment. Two experiments have been reported which tested these and further assumptions of the multi-system account of the enactment effect. In both experiments, inter- and intra-phrase (verb-object) associations were varied simultaneously in addition to enactment. In Experiment 1, the memory test was free recall, and in Experiment 2, it was cued recall. Independent effects of all three factors were observed in free recall. Enacted phrases were recalled better than phrases learned only verbally. Phrases with high-associated objects and verbs were better recalled than phrases with low-associated objects and verbs, and categorically related phrases were better recalled than unrelated phrases. In cued recall, there was no effect of categorical list structure. The effects of intra-phrase structure and enactment corresponded to those in free recall. All interactions were nonsignificant. The findings were interpreted as support for the multi-system account.     

Immediate and delayed memory tasks: A computerized behavioral measure of memory, attention, and impulsivity

The Immediate and Delayed Memory Task (IMT/DMT), a variant of the Continuous Performance Test (CPT), is a new software package designed to be a flexible research tool for the study of attention, memory, and impulsivity. This package allows researchers to determine the design to be used during a testing session and to manipulate many of the parameters. It features two components: the IMT and the DMT, both of which present sequential 2- to 7-digit stimuli with variable presentation rates and intertrial intervals. Subjects respond to identically matched stimuli presented consecutively, spanning a brief period of time (IMT), or to stimuli spanning a greater period of time (during which intervening stimuli to be ignored appear; DMT). Task complexity can be adjusted to suit applications for both children and adults. Preliminary studies have demonstrated that these laboratory tasks are sensitive to group differences, produce stable baselines of performance, and are sensitive to drug-induced performance decrements.     

Facilitation effect of observed motor deviants in a cooperative motor task: Evidence for direct perception of social intention in action

Spatiotemporal parameters of voluntary motor action may help optimize human social interactions. Yet it is unknown whether individuals performing a cooperative task spontaneously perceive subtly informative social cues emerging through voluntary actions. In the present study, an auditory cue was provided through headphones to an actor and a partner who faced each other. Depending on the pitch of the auditory cue, either the actor or the partner were required to grasp and move a wooden dowel under time constraints from a central to a lateral position. Before this main action, the actor performed a preparatory action under no time constraint, consisting in placing the wooden dowel on the central location when receiving either a neutral (“prêt”–ready) or an informative auditory cue relative to who will be asked to perform the main action (the actor: “moi”–me, or the partner: “lui”–him). Although the task focused on the main action, analysis of motor performances revealed that actors performed the preparatory action with longer reaction times and higher trajectories when informed that the partner would be performing the main action. In this same condition, partners executed the main actions with shorter reaction times and lower velocities, despite having received no previous informative cues. These results demonstrate that the mere observation of socially driven motor actions spontaneously influences the low-level kinematics of voluntary motor actions performed by the observer during a cooperative motor task. These findings indicate that social intention can be anticipated from the mere observation of action patterns.     

Poor motor skills: A risk marker for bully victimization

Children who are clumsy are often bullied. Nevertheless, motor skills have been overlooked in research on bullying victimization. A total of 2,730 Swedish adults (83% females) responded to retrospective questions on bullying, their talents in physical education (i.e., coordination and balls skills) and school academics. Poor talents were used as indicators of poor gross motor skills and poor academic skills. A subset of participants also provided information on educational level in adulthood, childhood obesity, belonging to an ethic minority in school and socioeconomic status relative to schoolmates. A total of 29.4% of adults reported being bullied in school, and 18.4% reported having below average gross motor skills. Of those with below average motor skills, 48.6% were bullied in school. Below average motor skills in childhood were associated with an increased risk (OR 3.01 [95% CI: 1.97–4.60]) of being bullied, even after adjusting for the influence of lower socioeconomic status, poor academic performance, being overweight, and being a bully. Higher odds for bully victimization were also associated with lower socioeconomic status (OR 2.29 [95% CI: 1.45–3.63]), being overweight (OR 1.71 [95% CI: 1.18–2.47]) and being a bully (OR 2.18 [95% CI: 1.53–3.11]). The findings indicate that poor gross motor skills constitute a robust risk‐marker for vulnerability for bully victimization. Aggr. Behav. 39:453–461, 2013. © 2013 The Authors. Aggressive Behavior Published by Wiley‐Blackwell     

ACT-PRO action protocol analyzer: A tool for analyzing discrete action protocols

This article presents a top-down approach for analyzing sequential events in behavioral data. Analysis of behavioral sequential data often entails identifying patterns specified by the researchers. Algorithms were developed and applied to analyze a kind of behavioral data, calleddiscrete action protocol data. Discrete action protocols consist of discrete user actions, such as mouse clicks and keypresses. Unfortunately, the process of analyzing the huge volume of actions (typically, > 10⁵) is very labor intensive. To facilitate this process, we developed an action protocol analyzer (ACT-PRO) that provides two levels of pattern matching. Level one uses formal grammars to identify sequential patterns. Level two matches these patterns to a hierarchical structure. ACT-PRO can be used to determine how well data fit the patterns specified by an experimenter. Complementarily, it can be used to focus an experimenter’s attention on data that do not fit the prespecified patterns.     

The compression block technique: use and misuse in the study of motor skills

Laszlo and Bairstow (1971b) claim that the compression block technique eliminates kinesthetic feedback prior to motor impairment and loss of motor control. They use evidence from studies employing the block to infer the nature of motor-skills processing. The present study, using two-point threshold, pro-prioceptive sensitivity, and hand and finger strength measures, yielded no evidence that afferent loss preceded loss of motor control.     

Physical activity and motor skills in children: A differentiated approach

Being physically active plays an essential role in a child's physical development. While there is ample evidence for a positive association between physical activity (PA) and motor skills in children, the question of how PA should be implemented to optimally foster motor skill proficiency is less clear. To address this gap, the current longitudinal study compared four groups of children with different patterns of leisure-time PA engagement—namely children engaging in either structured PA, unstructured PA, a combination of structured and unstructured PA, or no PA at all—with respect to their gross and fine motor skill development. Results of repeated measures mixed modeling procedures revealed that engaging in structured PA—either exclusively or in combination with unstructured PA—is beneficial for children's gross motor development, whereas engaging in unstructured PA lacks such effectiveness. As to fine motor skills, a beneficial tendency of structured PA was observed as well. Hence, PA seems to be beneficial for motor skill development particularly when implemented in a formal setting with guided opportunities for practice. In conclusion, regularly engaging in structured PA constitutes a promising way to promote motor skills and support motor development over the long term.     

Personality,time of day and delayed memory for tv news

An experiment was conducted to test the effects of time of day on delayed memory for televised news stories. Three groups received the same sequence of 6 news stories at 09.30, 13.30 and 16.30, respectively. Unexpected tests of free recall, cued recall and recognition were given about 2 hr after news presentation. Results showed that memory performance improved slightly across the day on tests of recall, and significantly so on recognition. Personality differences were also examined. In general, introverts remembered more than extraverts and differences between them were most marked during the late-afternoon session especially on free recall and when minimal cuing was provided. The results support previous time-of-day findings for delayed retention of complex learning materials. Personality differences observed here are consistent with predicted introvert-extravert differences in memory performance predicted by Eysenck's modified action-decrement hypothesis.     

Repetition and agreement with opposing arguments: A delayed action effect

If exposure to two arguments supporting opposing conclusions establishes two memory traces that influence attitudes, repetition of one of the arguments should produce a delayed action effect. In a computer-controlled experiment, subjects read a large number of arguments about fictitious brands of consumer products from a T.V. screen. They rated each brand immediately after reading about it and again after spending 10 min reading messages about other brands. In the critical conditions of the experiment, two arguments were presented about each brand. One described a good quality of the product (e.g., excellent durability); the other described a bad quality (e.g., below-average efficiency). Subjects read one of the opposing arguments concerning each brand repeatedly and studied the repeated arguments for memory tests. As predicted, repetition and studying affected ratings on the delayed post-test, but not on the immediate post-test. Specifically, attitudes shifted over the delay toward agreement with the repeated arguments, supporting the idea that the persistence of attitudes depends on more than one memory trace.     

Norms for 439 action events: Familiarity,emotionality, motor activity,and memorability

A total of 128 male and female university students having Swedish as their mother tongue rated 439 actions on a 7-point scale in the dimensions of Familiarity, Emotionality, Motor Activity, and Memorability under instructions to imagine themselves performing each action (e.g., “to roll a ball”, “to break a match”). Overall mean ratings were higher for women than for men in all four dimensions. High reliabilities were obtained in each scale. Intercorrelations between the dimensions were low to moderate, indicating that different characteristics of the actions were assessed. It is demonstrated that the ratings of the four dimensions are in agreement with previous categorisations of actions along the same or similar dimensions and with findings related to memory performance. Furthermore, control studies performed on the Familiarity dimension show that norm values are highly correlated with ratings given by participants in standard enacting and nonenacting conditions and with ratings in a condition where objects were present. These norms offer possibilities to control for and vary item characteristics of importance in the study of actions and the memory of actions.     

A study of retrieval processes in action memory for school-aged children: the impact of recall period and difficulty on action memory

ABSTRACT

Research in action memory for adults has shown that enacted encoding is not only retrieved more frequently but is also faster in comparison to verbal encoding. The aim of this study was to investigate retrieval processes in terms of recall period and recall difficulty for different encoding conditions in school-aged children (8-, 10-, 12-, 14-years old). The participants studied verbal tasks, subject-performed tasks and experimenter-performed tasks, and received immediate and final free-recall tests. The results revealed that older children not only outperformed younger children in terms of accuracy but also outpaced them in all recall periods. Moreover, recalls of subject-performed tasks and experimenter-performed tasks were better and faster compared with verbal encoding on both types of recall test, by increasing throughout the recall periods. These results are discussed in terms of memory strategies and information processing methods. Pedagogic implications for the use of action memory in children's learning are also considered.     

Perceived behavioural control,subjective norms,attitudes and intention to use condom: A longitudinal cross-lagged design

Based on the Theory of Planned Behaviour (TPB), the purpose of this investigation was to examine the directionality of the association among condom use, intention, attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control. The present study investigated the nature of these relationships using a longitudinal cross-lagged design applied to data from a cohort of 958 randomly selected Italian adults. Using structural equation modelling, two cross-lagged panel analyses revealed reciprocal relationships between intention and attitudes and between intention and condom use. Contrary to expectations, baseline subjective norms and perceived behavioural control did not predict subsequent intention to use condom when controlled for the autoregressive effect of intention at T1 on the same variable at T2. Also, perceived behavioural control at T1 did not influence condom use at T2 after controlling for the effect of baseline intention. The possibility of reciprocity was also tested for all relations and significant results were found. The moderation effect of perceived behavioural control on the relationship between intention and condom use was not significant. The differences in age, gender and partnership status were taken into account in the analyses.     

Evidence for the role of self-priming in epistemic action: expertise and the effective use of memory

Epistemic actions are physical actions people take to simplify internal problem solving rather than to move closer to an external goal. When playing the video game Tetris, for instance, experts routinely rotate falling shapes more than is strictly needed to place the shapes. Maglio and Kirsh [Kirsh, D., & Maglio, P. (1994). On distinguishing epistemic from pragmatic action. Cognitive Science, 18, 513-549; Maglio, P. P. (1995). The computational basis of interactive skill. PhD thesis, University of California, San Diego] proposed that such actions might serve the purpose of priming memory by external means, reducing the need for internal computation (e.g., mental rotation), and resulting in performance improvements that exceed the cost of taking additional actions. The present study tests this priming hypothesis in a set of four experiments. The first three explored precisely the conditions under which priming produces benefits. Results showed that presentation of multiple orientations of a shape led to faster responses than did presentation of a single orientation, and that this effect depended on the interval between preview and test. The fourth explored whether the benefit of seeing shapes in multiple orientations outweighs the cost of taking the extra actions to rotate shapes physically. Benefits were measured using a novel statistical method for mapping reaction-time data onto an estimate of the increase in processing capacity afforded by seeing multiple orientations. Cost was measured using an empirical estimate of time needed to take action in Tetris. Results showed that indeed the increase in internal processing capacity obtained from seeing shapes in multiple orientations outweighed the time to take extra actions.     

Pre-frontal executive committee for perception,working memory,attention, long-term memory,motor control,and thinking: a tutorial review

As an explicit organizing metaphor, memory aid, and conceptual framework, the prefrontal cortex may be viewed as a five-member 'Executive Committee,' as the prefrontal-control extensions of five sub-and-posterior-cortical systems: (1) the 'Perceiver' (dominant-right-hemisphere ventral-lateral prefrontal cortex--VL/PERC-PFC) is the frontal extension of the ventral perceptual stream (the VL/PERC system) which represents the world and self in object coordinates; (2) the 'Verbalizer' (dominant-left-hemisphere ventral-lateral prefrontal cortex system--VL/VERB-PFC) is the frontal extension of the language stream (the VL/VERB system) which represents the world and self in language coordinates; (3) the 'Motivator' (ventral/medial-orbital pre-frontal cortex--VMO-PFC) is the frontal cortical extension of a subcortical extended-amygdala stream (the VMO system) which represents the world and self in motivational/emotional coordinates; (4) the 'Attender' (dorsal-medial/anterior cingulate--DM/AC-PFC) is the frontal cortical extension of a subcortical extended-hippocampal stream (the DM/AC system) which represents the world and self in spatiotemporal coordinates and directs attention to internal and external events; and (5) the 'Coordinator' (the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex--DL-PFC) is the frontal extension of the dorsal perceptual stream (the DL system) which represents the world and self in body- and eye-coordinates and controls willed action and working memory. This tutorial review examines the interacting roles of these five systems in perception, working memory, attention, long-term memory, motor control, and thinking.