Transference and production of skilled movements

While stimulating the brain cells over the discussion re age and VO2 max, I re read a lot of my neurology books and journal publications. I will try to summarize some basics about motor learning, how it is stored. Motor control is our ability to move in space. Motor learning is the study of the acquisition and or modification of movement. While motor control focuses on understanding the control of movement already acquired (learning swimming technique), motor learning focuses on understanding the acquisition or modification of movement (refining technique.) Motor learning involves more than motor process. It involves learning new strategies for sensing as well as moving (e.g. the feel of the water) Thus, like motor control, emerges from a complex of perception-cognition-action process. This process of motor learning can be described as the search for a task that emerges from the interaction of the individual with the task and the environment. Procedural learning refers to learning tasks that can be performed automatically. This develops slowly through repetition of an act over many trials, and is expressed through improved performance of the task that was practiced. During motor skill acquisition, repeating a movement continuously under varying circumstances (eg drills) would typically lead to procedural learning. There are several theories related to Skilled Learning. Basically, after a person learns a movement 4 things are stored in memory. A) the initial movement conditions, such as position and amount of force, sequence of joints. B) the parameters used in the generalized motor program. C) the outcome of the movement in terms on knowledge of results and d) the sensory consequences of the movement. There are several factors involved in the consideration of movement training. 1. Feed back. There are 2 kinds. A) Intrinsic e.g. coming from the sensory systems as a result of the normal production of movement. This includes visual information as to the accuracy of the movement, as well as somatosensory information concerning the position of the limbs as one is moving. The person is able to tell say a coach how this movement feels. B) Extrinsic feedback is when another person asks the person to adjust the movement. 2. Feed forward. This occurs at a different level in the brain. It is when a person can draw on a past motor memory to reproduce that movement. If you ask a person to move their arms like they were swinging a baseball bat, then if they have done that movement they will be able to feed forward and reproduce the movement. 3. The brain does not process in a linear hierarchical manner. Processing is serial, parallel and multi-modal 4. Aspects of movement are ‘hardwired’. Synergies are coded in the brain through the ‘hardwiring of the groups of neurons. This is how the brain controls multiple degrees of freedom of the joints rapidly and efficiently. Simply put, neurons that fore together, wire together. For example when a person has a stoke and needs to re learn how to walk, they can through the process of feed forward and the pathways and muscle memory areas draw on that to gain movement back. 5. All movement relies on the sensory information in a “feedback” and a “feed forward” way. Feed back is especially important for the learning of a new movement. Movements are coded in the nervous system related to context and task. I have lots more including the differences between Kinesthesia, proprioception and body awareness all important in this learning process. However I think that this helps to illustrate why a person who has learnt to swim and has achieved a good skill level by swimming as a young person has the ability to swim well as an adult. I agree that the conditioning and training effects may not be there, but with training this will return to a degree, perhaps not quite to the same level. But that depends on the individual. The individual’s overall state of being influences the nervous system’s ability to learn. That is why late bloomers can learn and train and achieve. Just my thoughts!