Dual-process decomposition in human sensorimotor adaptation.

Area of Science:

• Neuroscience
• Motor Control
• Human Learning

Background:

• Sensorimotor adaptation in humans is influenced by multiple, distinct learning processes.
• Identifying and characterizing these individual processes is challenging due to observing only their summed contribution.
• Differential susceptibility to experimental manipulations offers a strategy for decomposing adaptation components.

Purpose of the Study:

• To identify and characterize the distinct learning processes contributing to human sensorimotor adaptation.
• To decompose the complex adaptation process into its fundamental constituent components.

Main Methods:

• Utilized experimental manipulations to exploit differential susceptibility of learning systems.
• Analyzed behavioral data to infer the properties of individual learning processes.

Main Results:

• Identified two fundamental systems contributing to sensorimotor adaptation.
• Characterized a slow, implicit system: temporally stable, expressible at low reaction times, and experience-independent.
• Characterized a rapid, explicit system: requiring long preparation, and exhibiting long-term memory.

Conclusions:

• Sensorimotor adaptation results from the interaction of at least two distinct learning systems.
• These systems differ in learning speed, awareness (implicit vs. explicit), temporal stability, and memory.
• Understanding these distinct systems advances knowledge of motor learning and control.