Department of Kinesiology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA.
Department of Biomedical Engineering, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, USA.
Dev Sci. 2018 Jul;21(4):e12614. doi: 10.1111/desc.12614. Epub 2017 Sep 27.
Examining age differences in motor learning using real-world tasks is often problematic due to task novelty and biomechanical confounds. Here, we investigated how children and adults acquire a novel motor skill in a virtual environment. Participants of three different age groups (9-year-olds, 12-year-olds, and adults) learned to use their upper body movements to control a cursor on a computer screen. Results showed that 9-year-old and 12-year-old children showed poorer ability to control the cursor at the end of practice. Critically, when we investigated the movement coordination, we found that the lower task performance of children was associated with limited exploration of their movement repertoire. These results reveal the critical role of motor exploration in understanding developmental differences in motor learning.
由于任务新颖性和生物力学混淆因素的影响，使用真实世界任务来研究运动学习中的年龄差异通常存在问题。在这里，我们研究了儿童和成人如何在虚拟环境中掌握新的运动技能。三个不同年龄组（9 岁、12 岁和成年人）的参与者学习使用他们的上半身运动来控制计算机屏幕上的光标。结果表明，9 岁和 12 岁的儿童在练习结束时表现出较差的光标控制能力。至关重要的是，当我们研究运动协调时，我们发现儿童的较低任务表现与他们的运动范围的有限探索有关。这些结果揭示了运动探索在理解运动学习发展差异中的关键作用。
