| Abstract: | Bimanual in-phase and anti-phase patterns were performed in the transverse plane under optimal and degraded proprioceptive conditions, i.e., without and with tendon vibration. Moreover, proprioceptive information was changed midway into each trial to examine on-line reorganization. In addition to the proprioceptive perturbation, the availability of visual information was manipulated to study to which degree sensory information from different modalities interact. Movement patterns performed under identical sensory conditions were compared, i.e., the first 15 s (control) and the 15 s following a change in afferent input (transfer). In the control and transfer conditions, movements with vibrations were less accurate than those without vibrations indicating the influence of optimal proprioceptive information in the calibration and recalibration of intrinsic bimanual movement patterns. Furthermore, pattern stability was affected by the nature of the transfer condition. This indicated that the degree of fluctuations in a sensory transfer situation depended upon the quality of the proprioceptive information experienced in the initial conditions. The influence of visual information was not without importance, although the nature of the coordination mode must be taken into account. In the control conditions, in-phase movements were less stable when vision was absent, whereas anti-phase movements were more stable when vision was not present. This observation was made independent of the available proprioceptive information revealing differences in visual guidance between both coordination modes. In the transfer conditions, pattern stability was similar during the vision and no-vision conditions suggesting a limited influence of visual information in the recalibration process. |
