Influence of Normal Aging and Multisensory Data Fusion on Cybersickness and Postural Adaptation in Immersive Virtual Reality.

Unlabelled: Immersive Virtual Reality (VR) systems are expanding as sensorimotor readaptation tools for older adults. However, this purpose may be challenged by cybersickness occurrences possibly caused by sensory conflicts. This study aims to analyze the effects of aging and multisensory data fusion processes in the brain on cybersickness and the adaptation of postural responses when exposed to immersive VR.

Tolerance of immersive head-mounted virtual reality among older nursing home residents.

Introduction: Virtual Reality (VR) is a tool that is increasingly used in the aging population. Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs) are stereoscopic vision devices used for immersive VR. Cybersickness is sometimes reported after head-mounted display (HMD) VR exposure.

Relationships between empathy and creativity in collective games: a comparison between handball and sitting ball.

In collective motor situations, creativity and empathy are central and strongly connected to cognitive and affective processes. Indeed, in the environment of high social uncertainty of games and sports, empathy would allow the player to anticipate motor behaviors in order to promote creative decision-making, i.e.

Improving upper-limb and trunk kinematics by interactive gaming in individuals with chronic stroke: A single-blinded RCT.

Background: Commercial gaming systems are increasingly being used for stroke rehabilitation; however, their effect on upper-limb recovery versus compensation is unknown.

Objectives: We aimed to compare the effect of upper-limb rehabilitation using interactive gaming (Nintendo Wii) with dose-matched conventional therapy on elbow extension (recovery) and forward trunk motion (compensation) in individuals with chronic stroke. Secondary aims were to compare the effect on (1) clinical tests of impairment and activity, pain and effort, and (2) trajectory kinematics.

Influence of Traditional Sporting Games on the Development of Creative Skills in Team Sports. The Case of Football.

The aim of this present study is to investigate the influence of three learning contexts on the development of motor creativity of young footballers (8-9 years old). In team sport, creativity is a fundamental issue because it allows players to adapt in an environment of high social uncertainty. To carry out this work, we suggest a method for assessing motor creativity into ecological situations based on the analysis of praxical communications.

Modulation of ellipses drawing by sonification.

Most studies on the regulation of speed and trajectory during ellipse drawing have used visual feedback. We used online auditory feedback (sonification) to induce implicit movement changes independently from vision. The sound was produced by filtering a pink noise with a band-pass filter proportional to movement speed.

Ears on the Hand: Reaching Three-Dimensional Targets With an Audio-Motor Device.

Understanding the processes underlying sensorimotor coupling with the environment is crucial for sensorimotor rehabilitation and sensory substitution. In doing so, devices which provide novel sensory feedback consequent to body movement may be optimized in order to enhance motor performance for particular tasks. The aim of the study reported here was to investigate audio-motor coupling when the auditory experience is linked to movements of the head or the hands.

A strategy of faster movements used by elderly humans to lift objects of increasing weight in ecological context.

It is not known whether, during the course of aging, changes occur in the motor strategies used by the CNS for lifting objects of different weights. Here, we analyzed the kinematics of object-lifting in two different healthy groups (young and elderly people) plus one well-known deafferented patient (GL). The task was to reach and lift onto a shelf an opaque cylindrical object with changing weight.

Investigating three types of continuous auditory feedback in visuo-manual tracking.

The use of continuous auditory feedback for motor control and learning is still understudied and deserves more attention regarding fundamental mechanisms and applications. This paper presents the results of three experiments studying the contribution of task-, error-, and user-related sonification to visuo-manual tracking and assessing its benefits on sensorimotor learning. First results show that sonification can help decreasing the tracking error, as well as increasing the energy in participant's movement.

Sensori-Motor Learning with Movement Sonification: Perspectives from Recent Interdisciplinary Studies.

This article reports on an interdisciplinary research project on movement sonification for sensori-motor learning. First, we describe different research fields which have contributed to movement sonification, from music technology including gesture-controlled sound synthesis, sonic interaction design, to research on sensori-motor learning with auditory-feedback. In particular, we propose to distinguish between sound-oriented tasks and movement-oriented tasks in experiments involving interactive sound feedback.

From ear to hand: the role of the auditory-motor loop in pointing to an auditory source.

Studies of the nature of the neural mechanisms involved in goal-directed movements tend to concentrate on the role of vision. We present here an attempt to address the mechanisms whereby an auditory input is transformed into a motor command. The spatial and temporal organization of hand movements were studied in normal human subjects as they pointed toward unseen auditory targets located in a horizontal plane in front of them.

Perceptual weight judgments when viewing one's own and others' movements under minimalist conditions of visual presentation.

Across five experiments, we investigated the parameters involved in the observation and in the execution of the action of lifting an object. The observers were shown minimal information on movements, consisting of either the working-point displacement only (ie two points representing the hand and object) or additional configural information on the kinematics of the trunk, shoulder, arm, forearm, and hand, joined by a stick diagram. Furthermore, displays showed either a participant's own movements or those of another person, when different weights were lifted.

Direct kinematic modeling of the upper limb during trunk-assisted reaching.

The study proposes a rigid-body biomechanical model of the trunk and whole upper limb including scapula and the test of this model with a kinematic method using a six-dimensional (6-D) electromagnetic motion capture (mocap) device. Large unconstrained natural trunk-assisted reaching movements were recorded in 7 healthy subjects. The 3-D positions of anatomical landmarks were measured and then compared to their estimation given by the biomechanical chain fed with joint angles (the direct kinematics).

Effect of auditory feedback differs according to side of hemiparesis: a comparative pilot study.

Background: Following stroke, patients frequently demonstrate loss of motor control and function and altered kinematic parameters of reaching movements. Feedback is an essential component of rehabilitation and auditory feedback of kinematic parameters may be a useful tool for rehabilitation of reaching movements at the impairment level. The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of 2 types of auditory feedback on the kinematics of reaching movements in hemiparetic stroke patients and to compare differences between patients with right (RHD) and left hemisphere damage (LHD).

Relationship of glenohumeral elevation and 3-dimensional scapular kinematics with disability in patients with shoulder disorders.

Objective: To determine variables among glenohumeral elevation and 3-dimensional scapular rotations that are related to shoulder function as assessed by the Disability of the Arm, Shoulder and Hand-Disability/Symptom (DASH-D/S) scale.

Design: Prospective, cross-sectional study.

Patients: Eighty-eight patients with shoulder pain and limited range of motion were included.

The trunk as a part of the kinematic chain for arm elevation in healthy subjects and in patients with frozen shoulder.

During arm elevation, the trunk may have both a postural and synergic role, but few 3-D experimental studies exist of the phenomenon, and the contribution of trunk rotations to arm elevation has not been studied in patients with frozen shoulder. Thirty healthy volunteers performed maximal dominant arm elevation in 2 planes, sagittal (anteflexion) and frontal (abduction), and 13 patients with unilateral frozen shoulder performed arm elevation on the unaffected then affected side. Trunk rotations and humeral elevation were measured with use of an electromagnetic system (Polhemus Fastrak).

Three-dimensional scapular kinematics and scapulohumeral rhythm in patients with glenohumeral osteoarthritis or frozen shoulder.

We aimed to describe 3D scapular kinematics and scapulohumeral rhythm (SHR) in glenohumeral (GH) osteoarthritis shoulders compared to unaffected shoulders and to compare the abnormal scapular kinematic schema for GH osteoarthritis with that for frozen shoulder. Thirty-two patients with stiff shoulder (16 with GH osteoarthritis and 16 with frozen shoulder) performed maximal arm elevation in two planes, sagittal and frontal. Scapular rotations and humeral elevation of the affected and unaffected shoulders were measured by the Polhemus Fastrak electromagnetic system.

Learning to perceive with a visuo-auditory substitution system: localisation and object recognition with 'the vOICe'.

We investigated to what extent participants can acquire the mastery of an auditory-substitution-of-vision device ('The vOICe') using dynamic tasks in a three-dimensional environment. After extensive training, participants took part in four experiments. In the first experiment we explored locomotion and localisation abilities.

There is something out there: distal attribution in sensory substitution, twenty years later.

Sensory substitution constitutes an interesting domain of study to consider the philosopher's classical question of distal attribution: how we can distinguish between a sensation and the perception of an object that causes this sensation. We tested the hypothesis that distal attribution consists of three distinct components: an object, a perceptual space, and a coupling between subjects' movements and stimulation. We equipped sixty participants with a visual-to-auditory substitution device, without any information about it.

Shoulder movements during the initial phase of learning manual wheelchair propulsion in able-bodied subjects.

Background: The kinetics and kinematics of the glenohumeral joints, and shoulder muscles activities during the initial phase of learning wheelchair propulsion by individuals with paraplegia have been partially described. But no studies carry out the kinematics of the upper-limb during the learning of non-constrained open field locomotion with a wheelchair.

Methods: Ten subjects with no manual wheelchair experience propelled themselves repetitively straight ahead along an 11m linear path.

Speed-accuracy tradeoff during performance of a tracking task without visual feedback.

To help people with visual impairment, especially people with severely impaired vision, access graphic information on a computer screen, we have carried out fundamental research on the effect of increasing the number of detection fields. In general, application of the parallelism concept enables information to be accessed more precisely and easily when the number of sensors is high. We have developed a "Braille Box" by modifying Braille cells to form a tactile stimulator array which is compatible with the fingertip.