The Effects of Easy-to-Difficult versus Difficult-to-Easy Practice Order on a Bimanual Lever-Positioning Task

An experiment was designed to investigate whether an easy-to-difficult or a difficult-to-easy practice order is best for motor learning. The motor skill used was a fine-motor, bimanual, lever-positioning task with movement complexity as the difficulty variable, which had yet to be studied. One group learned the skill in an easy-to-difficult order with the combination of the two lever movements increasing in difficulty, and one group learned the skill in a difficult-to-easy order with the combination of the two movements decreasing in difficulty. Questions were asked after each condition to gauge participants' levels of self-efficacy, confidence, and frustration. Both groups returned after 24 hours to complete a transfer and retention test. The results support Maxwell, Masters, Kerr, and Weedon's (2001) findings that an easy-to-difficult order leads to greater retention and transfer due to implicit learning of the task. Both groups experienced similar levels of confidence, so confidence does not appear to be a factor determining superiority of task progressions versus degressions. These findings suggest that, when learning a new fine-motor, bimanual, complex task, practice should be introduced in an easy-to-difficult order to optimize retention and transfer.