Comparison of dependency to attention for implicit sequential motor learning in young and elderly groups

Background: Complex motor behaviors are formed from a chain of primitive behaviors. Motor sequence is the basis of a lot of human's intelligent behavior. The purpose of this study was to compare the amount of dependency on attention in implicit sequential motor learning in two groups of youth and elderly.Materials and Methods: Two groups including 15 young people, aged 20 to 30 years, and 15 elderly, aged 60 to 75 years from Kashan Retired Teachers Center, enrolled to this study in 2007. For data analysis, SPSS version 13 and ANOVA test for estimation of number of responses, errors and the efficiency of the second task paired t-test for comparing the regular and irregular blocks in one group and independent t-test for comparison of two groups of youth and elderly people were used. Results: The study showed that in young group exposed to the mutual task, response time and errors of the first task (the time of sequence response) decreased. In elderly group, the response time and errors didn't show a significant difference in both regular and irregular phases. The efficiency of the second task didn't show any significant difference in the two groups. Conclusion: Implicit learning in elderly is dependent on attention. According to the findings, motor learning in rehabilitation and exercise therapy of elder adults should not overloaded by the cognitive task

The effects of linear, nonlinear, and differential motor learning methods on the emergence of creative action in individual soccer players

Objective: The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of linear (LP), nonlinear (NLP), and differential (DL) motor learning methods on the emergence of creative actions in soccer. Method: Sixty-six novice players were randomly allocated to one of three groups, which practiced soccer skills for three months, according to different motor learning methods. In the LP-group, attention was focused on acquiring movement patterns largely through prescriptive instructions and feedback and frequent repetitions. By contrast, in the NLP-group, the aim was to guide the players’ search for movement solutions. This was done by manipulating task constraints to induce practice variability. Finally, in the DL-group, prescriptive instructions were again used, but now to maximize random variation in the practice of movement patterns. Results: Behavioral analysis after the three-month training showed that the number of different actions (i.e., variability) was highest in the NLP-group, followed by DL-group, whereas the LP-group showed the lowest number of different actions. Similarly, the NLP-group and DL-group demonstrated more original and creative actions than the LP-group. Conclusion: In sum, the NLP and DL motor learning methods, which aim to promote motor variability in practice, are most conducive for the emergence of creative actions. Coaches are advised to design training environment that help learners increase their adaptive motor repertoire and creative actions