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Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jan 11, 2026

Acquisition of a High-precision Skilled Forelimb Reaching Task in Rats

Acquisition of a High-precision Skilled Forelimb Reaching Task in Rats

Published on: June 22, 2015

Switching between Newly Learned Motor Skills.

Kahori Kita^1,2, Yue Du^3,4, Travis Tran³

¹Department of Neurology, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21287 kahori.kita@gmail.com.

The Journal of Neuroscience : the Official Journal of the Society for Neuroscience

|November 10, 2025

Summary

Switching between motor skills incurs a transient cost, similar to cognitive tasks. Errors arise from persisting with previous motor control policies, especially with newly learned skills.

Keywords:

de novo learning motor control motor skill switch cost task switching

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Area of Science:

Motor control and learning
Cognitive psychology
Human motor performance

Background:

Cognitive flexibility research identifies switch costs when tasks change.
The existence of analogous switch costs in motor skill acquisition is less understood.

Purpose of the Study:

To investigate whether switching between different motor skills incurs switch costs.
To determine the source of errors during motor skill switching.

Main Methods:

Participants learned and switched between motor skills with novel and intuitive visuomotor mappings.
Error rates were analyzed immediately following switches between skills.
Perseveration of preswitch policies was assessed as a potential error source.

Main Results:

Increased errors were observed in trials immediately after switching motor skills.
Errors were primarily due to perseveration with the previous motor control policy.
Switching between two newly learned skills was initially difficult but improved with training.

Conclusions:

Switching between newly learned motor skills presents challenges.
Motor skill switching errors are largely attributed to perseveration with the incorrect control policy.
These findings highlight the interplay between cognitive and motor control during skill acquisition and switching.