Andras Semjen's research while affiliated with French National Centre for Scientific Research and other places
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Publications (28)
Constraints underlying bimanual coordination have traditionally been explained by dynamic interactions between the effectors. However, the present experiments demonstrate that a fundamental constraint on bimanual performance is the manner in which task goals are represented. In Experiment 1, participants vocalized during in-phase and anti-phase bim...
We investigated the role of somatosensory feedback during bimanual coordination by testing a bilaterally deafferented patient, a unilaterally deafferented patient, and three control participants on a repetitive bimanual circle-drawing task. Circles were drawn symmetrically or asymmetrically at varying speeds with full, partial, or no vision of the...
Rhythmic bimanual movements have been the dominant task for understanding coordination involving multiple effectors. This paradigm has led to the development of sophisticated, quantitative models, applicable across a range of situations. However, the role of movement goals during the performance of bimanual movements has received relatively little...
We argue that bimanual coordination and interference depends critically on how these actions are represented on a cognitive level. We first review the literature on spatial interactions, focusing on the difference between movements directed at visual targets and movements cued symbolically. Interactions manifest during response planning are limited...
The spatial and temporal coupling between the hands is known to be very robust during movements which use homologous muscles (in-phase or symmetric movements). In contrast, movements using nonhomologous muscles (antiphase or asymmetric movements) are less stable and exhibit a tendency to undergo a phase transition to in-phase movements as movement...
We argue that bimanual coordination and interference depends critically on how these actions are represented on a cognitive level. We first review the literature on spatial interactions, focusing on the difference between movements directed at visual targets and movements cued symbolically. Interactions manifest during response planning are limited...
Rhythmic bimanual movements are highly constrained in the temporal domain, with the gestures of the two hands tightly synchronized. Previous studies have implicated a subcortical locus for temporal coupling based on the observation that these constraints persist in callosotomy patients. We now report that such coupling is restricted to movements en...
Motor events are behaviorally meaningful, discrete entities (e.g., key strokes) that are generated at some specific portion of an effector's movement trajectory. Bimanual coordination may be conceptualized with reference to such discrete motor events or with reference to continuous movement trajectories. Studies inspired by the former approach sugg...
Participants performed a three-beat (strong-weak-weak) finger-tapping pattern with one hand while synchronizing taps of the other hand with either the strong tap (metrically congruous rhythm) or one of the weak taps (metrically incongruous rhythms). We tested the hypothesis that performance would be less stable during the production of the incongru...
Single and alternating hand tapping were compared to test the hypothesis that coordination during rhythmic movements is mediated by the control of specific time intervals. In Experiment 1, an auditory metronome was used to indicate a set of timing patterns in which a 1-s interval was divided into 2 subintervals. Performance, measured in terms of th...
Two experiments required right-handed subjects to trace circular trajectories while complying with either a symmetric or asymmetric pattern. In symmetric patterns, circles were traced in a mirror image either inward or outward. In asymmetric patterns, circles were traced in the same direction either clockwise or counterclockwise. Subjects were inst...
Seven right-handed participants performed bimanual circling movements in either a symmetrical or an asymmetrical coordination mode. Movements were paced with an auditory metronome at predetermined frequencies corresponding to transition frequency, where asymmetrical patterns became unstable, or at two-thirds transition frequency where both symmetri...
Five participants were tested on their ability to produce accurate and regular inter-response intervals in the 350 to 530 ms time range. Three of them were members of the French-Russian CASSIOPEE 96 spaceflight mission, and the other two were control subjects tested on the ground. During spaceflight, the target inter-response intervals were increas...
Most studies of synchronization have focused on how an established phase relationship between self-produced events (e.g.,
finger taps) and the clicks of a metronome is maintained when the metronome is regular or subject to unpredictable perturbations.
Here we study how synchronization is initially established, using an experimental paradigm in whic...
Three subjects performed sequences of periodic movements by synchronizing their movements (button pressing with the thumb) to a series of visual stimuli (induction phase), and by continuing to produce the movements with the same rhythm after the metronome had been switched off (continuation phase). The required inter-response intervals (IRIs) were...
A bimanual circle drawing task was employed to elucidate the dynamics of intralimb and interlimb coordination. Right-handed subjects were required to produce circles with both hands in either a symmetrical (mirror) mode (i.e. one hand moving clockwise, the other counter-clockwise) or in an asymmetrical mode (i.e. both hands moving clockwise or coun...
The influence of focal attention on the coordination dynamics in a bimanual circle drawing task was investigated. Six right-handed and seven left-handed subjects performed bimanual circling movements, in two modes of coordination, symmetrical or asymmetrical. The frequency of movement was scaled by an auditory metronome from 1.50 Hz to 3.00 Hz in 7...
Motor program updating was studied by asking 2 subjects to modify the accent pattern of rapid finger-tapping sequences during execution. The tap to be accentuated was changed unpredictably in one-third of the trials; on these trials the signal indicating the new accent position was delivered upon the onset of the first tap. The probability of placi...
An experiment is reported which examined the timing characteristics of finger-tapping sequences that consisted of segments of repeated and alternating elements. Eight musically-trained subjects performed the experiment. They tapped the sequences on a set of response keys that allowed identification of the onset and offset of finger to key contact....
Previous work has shown that a sequential plan for movements can be selected prior to, and independently of, the selection of its particular effector realization. In the present study, we addressed the question of whether selection of a sequential plan for movements may also be “content free”, i.e., based upon relational (structural) properties, at...
Three experiments are reported that examine whether fast finger-tapping sequences are entirely planned before execution starts (advance planning), or if they can be started while planning is still under way (distributed planning). Subjects performed finger tapping sequences of three to eight taps at a high rate, under both simple and 2-choice react...
An experiment was performed to test the predictions made by the subprogram retrieval model (Sternberg et al. 1978) for the production of rapid movement sequences, and to search for the maximum number of elements that can be planned in advance of sequence execution. Subjects performed rapid sequences of 1 to 8 finger taps under both simple and choic...
Advance planning and execution-time organization of sequences of five finger taps were studied in four experiments. Intertap intervals were required to be equal. In some experimental conditions, one of the taps had to be stronger than the other four. Serial position of the stressed tap, number of alternative stress positions, and tapping rate were...
Accentuation involves modulation of motor intensity. It differentiates a movement from others within a motor sequence. Does the serial position of the accent characterize the whole sequence as a particular response? How are the control of time and force coordinated in the motor sequence? Subjects produced sequences of four fingertaps on a key. Time...
The late or intercurrent facilitation of the soleus H reflex recovery cycle was studied during the preparatory period of a visual reaction time task. Response preparation produced three kinds of effect on the conditioned reflex elicited 200 msec before the end of the preparatory period: depression of the conditioned reflex which was maximum at the...
Choice reaction time and movement time were measured in a discrete visuo manual pointing task. Two movement amplitudes (7.5 cm and 30 cm) and two target widths (1.5 cm and 6 cm) were used in all possible combinations. Movement time varied according to movement amplitude and to target width. However, some departure from the linear relationship betwe...
The time-course of H-reflexes amplitude was studied in the two soleus muscles during the preparatory period (PP) of a go-no-go choice reaction time (RT) task. A click, as warning signal (WS), started the PP. The subject (s) performed an extension of the left foot when a visual response signal (RS) located on the left occurred. No response was to be...
Citations
... Existing investigations into the effect of spatially congruent cues on rhythmic bimanual movements primarily focus on rhythmic circling movements, whereas repetitive finger tapping movements have received less attention. This is an important distinction because rhythmic bimanual tapping and circling may be fundamentally different classes of movement with distinct coordination principles (R. Ivry et al., 2004;. For example, performance on rhythmic finger tapping and rhythmic circle drawing tasks does not correlate within subjects (Pope & Studenka, 2019;Robertson et al., 1999;Zelaznik et al., 2000Zelaznik et al., , 2002Zelaznik et al., , 2005. ...
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... Maintaining unity of action is facilitated by foreknowledge of the motor aspects of a task. For example, Semjen and Requin (1976) varied the amount of preparatory time along with varying response specificity by manipulating the angle between movements required by the stimulus to respond. Preparation time influenced RT less when the response could be readily specified (i.e., responses were separated by a wide angle) than when the response was aspecific (i.e., responses were separated by a narrow angle). ...
... Two observations align with this view. First, longer sequences often take longer to initiate (i.e., to begin the first action in the sequence) compared to shorter sequences (Garcia-Colera & Semjen, 1987;Klapp, 1995;Sternberg et al., 1978;Stöcker & Hoffmann, 2004;Verwey, 2003;Verwey & Eikelboom, 2003), an observation known as the sequence length effect. This observation is assumed to reflect the additional time required to plan more items prior to execution (Sternberg et al., 1978;Verwey & Eikelboom, 2003). ...
Reference: Repetition costs in sequence chunking
... The context of the task influences the character of bimanual interaction (Swinnen and Wenderoth, 2004). Movements can be divided into in-phase movements such as lifting a heavy object with both arms simultaneously and anti-phase movements such as freestyle swimming (Ivry et al., 2003). Both require a precise spatial and temporal coupling for a successful execution. ...
... First, information-processing, or 'timekeeper' models (Buhusi & Meck, 2005;Gibbon, 1977;Gibbon et al., 1984) assume that duration between events is represented by the count of pulses of an internal "pacemaker" generated during an interval (Treisman et al., 1990). However, adaptation to perturbations in external rhythms is only specified in motor implementations of these models (Semjen et al., 1998;van der Steen & Keller, 2013;Vorberg & Wing, 1996), which involves updating the timekeeper interval or correcting for timing errors between event onsets and feedback of motor actions. ...
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... 9 An alternative explanation for the sequence length effect reduction with practice is that participants learn to immediately execute the first response, and the ensuing movements are planned after initiating the first response (Klapp & Jagacinski, 2011;Portier et al., 1990;Schröter & Leuthold, 2009). This option is consistent with the present assumption of independent central and motor processors in that it assumes that the central processor can load the motor buffer while the motor processor executes the first movement Semjen, 1992;Semjen & Garcia-Colera, 1986;Verwey, 1995). ...
... In early work performed by Kelso and colleagues, rhythmic in-phase movements were consistently Communicated by Winston D Byblow. found to be easier to perform (i.e., lower attentional load), while rhythmic anti-phase movements take more practice to perform (i.e., higher attentional load) (Wuyts et al. 1996;Monno et al. 2002;Ridderikhoff et al. 2008). Additionally, when performing the anti-phase movement, increasing the frequency of movement (speed) causes the anti-phase movement to phase transition to the in-phase movement pattern-the more stable of the two coordination modes (Haken et al. 1985). ...
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... This provides the opportun ity to study simultaneously the time course of changes in the output of motoneuron pools, both those involved and those not involved in the response. Until now only ISis of I sec have been investigated (Gerilowski & Tsekov, 1975;Mitchie, Clarke, Sinden, & Glue, 1975;Requin, 1969;Requin, Bonnet , & Semjen, 1977;Semjen, Bonnet, & Requin, 1973). In Experiment 2, the response had to be made by finger movements. ...
... Therefore, Class1 P and the high expertise group were perfectly superposed and so much so that results revealed that the motor organization of this class was more homogenous than the other class and even more homogenous than classes in the S condition. This finding seems to confirm that adaptation modalities to new postural configurations are dependant on the level of expertise and motor experience of the athlete (Bonnet et al., 1981). The high level sprinters, who presented stable and efficient management in the velocity gain in the S condition, were perturbed by the postural modification and sought to stabilise body movement (Vernazza et al., 1996;Mihelj et al., 2000). ...
... -The nature of spinal events during the foreperiod remains equivocal. Although an inhibition of spinal reflexes during the foreperiod was initially reported (17) and supported by subsequent studies (1,18,19), other studies have reported either no change (20)(21)(22) or even a facilitation (23)(24)(25) of motoneuron excitability during the foreperiod. A more recent publication has concluded that the large interindividual variability of motoneuron excitability during the foreperiod in young adults reflects different movement strategies inherent to individual subjects (26). ...
