CHANGES IN MOVEMENT REGULARITY DURING LEARNING OF A NOVEL DISCRETE TASK

Abstract

Sample entropy and surrogate methods were employed to investigate changes in regularity of movement profiles during the learning of a novel discrete task under contextual interference conditions by two groups. The contextual interference effect was confirmed. Surrogate methods were used to show the presence of deterministic dynamics in observed data. Trends of decreased and increased movement regularity for groups 1 and 2 respectively were observed. The relative stage of learning and the ability to operate within an acceptable range of variability/complexity may explain these trends. Entropy estimates as a measure of regularity may provide important information about the learning of discrete tasks.