Learning complex motor behaviors like riding a bicycle or swinging a golf club is based on acquiring neural representations of the mechanical requirements of movement (e.g., coordinating muscle forces to control the club). Here we provide evidence that mechanisms matching observation and action facilitate motor learning. Subjects who observed a video depicting another person learning to reach i...

Knowledge about aging of perceptual-motor skills is based almost exclusively on cross-sectional studies. We examined age-related changes in the retention of mirror-tracing skills in healthy adults who practiced for 3 separate days at baseline and retrained 5 years later at follow-up. Overall, the speed and accuracy of an acquired skill were partially retained after a 5-year interim, although th...

The purpose of this review is to investigate how transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) can modulate implicit motor sequence learning and consolidation. So far, most of the studies have focused on the modulating effect of tDCS for explicit motor learning. Here, we focus explicitly on implicit motor sequence learning and consolidation in order to improve our understanding about the poten...

BACKGROUND Previous studies have shown that primary motor cortex (M1) excitability is modulated by motor skill learning and that the M1 plays a crucial role in motor memory. However, the following questions remain: (1) At what stage do changes in M1 excitability occur? (2) Are learning-induced changes in leg M1 excitability associated with motor memory? Here, we did two experiments to answer th...

We have recently demonstrated that visuospatial working memory performance predicts the rate of motor skill learning, particularly during the early phase of visuomotor adaptation. Here, we follow up these correlational findings with direct manipulations of working memory resources to determine the impact on visuomotor adaptation, a form of motor learning. We conducted two separate experiments. ...

The contextual interference effect is a well-established motor learning phenomenon. Most of the contextual interference effect literature has addressed simple skills, while less is known about the role of contextual interference in complex sport skill practice, particularly with respect to skilled performers. The purpose of this study was to assess contextual interference when practicing the te...

BACKGROUND Feldenkrais Method balance classes have been found to be effective in improving balance in recent studies, but there has been little research into possible mechanisms behind the effectiveness of these classes. Indeed, there has been little research into the content of any balance training classes. OBJECTIVES To analyse the content of a series of Feldenkrais Method balance classes t...

A complex interplay has been demonstrated between motor and sensory systems. We showed recently that motor learning leads to changes in the sensed position of the limb (Ostry DJ, Darainy M, Mattar AA, Wong J, Gribble PL. J Neurosci 30: 5384-5393, 2010). Here, we document further the links between motor learning and changes in somatosensory perception. To study motor learning, we used a force fi...

Skilled performers such as athletes or musicians can improve their performance by imagining the actions or sensory outcomes associated with their skill. Performers vary widely in their auditory and motor imagery abilities, and these individual differences influence sensorimotor learning. It is unknown whether imagery abilities influence both memory encoding and retrieval. We examined how audito...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW Much of neurorehabilitation rests on the assumption that patients can improve with practice. This review will focus on arm movements and address the following questions: (i) What is motor learning? (ii) Do patients with hemiparesis have a learning deficit? (iii) Is recovery after injury a form of motor learning? (iv) Are approaches based on motor learning principles useful for...