Chapter 4 :Chapter 4 Skill Memory: Learning By Doing Slides prepared by Mary Waterstreet, St. Ambrose University


Qualities of Skill Memories :2 Qualities of Skill Memories Skill—an enduring ability that develops with practice over time. Skill memories: Cannot always be verbalized Unconsciously acquired and retrieved Basis for memories of events and facts


Comparison of Memories for Skills, Events, Facts :3 Comparison of Memories for Skills, Events, Facts


Perceptual-Motor Skills :4 Perceptual-Motor Skills Perceptual-motor skills—learned movement patterns guided by sensory inputs. Enduring abilities developed with practice. Closed skills—involve established movements (ballet, diving, gymnastics). Open skills—respond to environmental changes (swing dancing, soccer, hockey). Any skill lies somewhere on the continuum from closed to open.


Cognitive Skills :5 Cognitive Skills Cognitive Skills—emphasize problem solving or applying strategies (e.g., Tower of Hanoi puzzle).


Cognitive Skills :6 Cognitive Skills Tool use involves perceptual-motor and cognitive skills. Chimpanzees crack nuts with stones. Dolphins carry sponges to protect themselves from injury while foraging for food. Lars Bedjer


Expertise and Talent :7 Expertise and Talent Talent—mastering a skill with little effort (a “gift”). Expertise—performing a skill better than most people.


Nature and Perceptual-Motor Skills :8 Nature and Perceptual-Motor Skills Rotary pursuit task—a task where the user must hold the end of a pointed stick above a target on a rotating disk. Twins learned a rotary pursuit task. Skills of identical twins reared apart became more similar. Skills of fraternal twins reared apart became less similar. Genetic differences may become more apparent with practice.


The Rotary Pursuit Task: Effects of Practice on Performance :9 The Rotary Pursuit Task: Effects of Practice on Performance (b, c) Adapted from Fox et al., 1996.


Perceptual-Motor Skills :10 Perceptual-Motor Skills Researchers often study athletes and chess masters. Games require a variety of perceptual-motor and cognitive skills; diverse levels of expertise. Chess masters quickly focus on key board locations, empty squares, relevant chess pieces; amateurs slowly scan many locations.


Practice :11 Practice Knowledge of results—performance feedback Performance feedback improves practice effectiveness.


Acquiring Skills :12 Acquiring Skills Power Law of Learning—for perceptual-motor skills, learning first occurs rapidly, then slows, following a predictable pattern. More proficiency = less room for improvement


Acquiring Skills :13 Acquiring Skills Feedback can improve the effects of practice; not all feedback is equally helpful. The kind of feedback can determine how practice effects performance. e.g., in simple tasks: Frequent feedback produces good short-term, but mediocre long-term performance. Infrequent feedback yields mediocre short-term, but better long-term performance.


Acquiring Skills: Apportioned Effort :14 Acquiring Skills: Apportioned Effort Massed practice = concentrated practice Better short term retention Spaced practice = practice spread out over several sessions Better long term retention


Acquiring Skills: Practice Conditions :15 Acquiring Skills: Practice Conditions Constant practice = repeatedly practicing the same skill under the same conditions. Variable practice = practicing a skill in varied conditions. Optimal practice schedules are debatable.


Implicit Learning :16 Implicit Learning Implicit learning—learning without direct awareness One can incidentally learn an underlying skill that facilitates performance. Serial reaction time task—participants learn to press one of four computer keys from visual cues. Cues are in random or repeating patterns. Participants show quicker performance on repeated patterns without pattern awareness.


Serial Reaction Time Task and Implicit Learning :17 Serial Reaction Time Task and Implicit Learning Adapted from Exner et al., 2002.


Implicit Learning and Anterograde Amnesia :18 Implicit Learning and Anterograde Amnesia Inability to form new episodic and semantic memories. Example: H.M. (developed anterograde amnesia after surgery to reduce seizures) Patients can learn new skills. Patients do not verbally recall their practice trials.


Retention and Forgetting :19 Retention and Forgetting Skill memory is developed through practice. If we don’t use a skill, the skill is vulnerable to skill decay. Skill memory is subject to interference: Proactive Interference = difficulty learning and remembering newer material Retroactive Interference = difficulty remembering older material


Transfer of Training :20 Transfer of Training How well might you perform a skill in a context that is different from the context at encoding? In some cases, skill memory is so specific introduction of additional cues can disrupt performance.


Transfer of Training :21 Transfer of Training Transfer specificity—restricted applicability of learned skills to specific situations Encoding and subsequent practice in a certain context might lead to transfer specificity, which limits transfer of training.


Models of Skill Memory:Motor Programs and Rules :22 Models of Skill Memory:Motor Programs and Rules In initial learning of a new skill, we tend to follow a set of rules (declarative). With practice: Steps become automatic (motor programs). Attention to the declarative rules become unimportant.


Stages of Acquisition :23 Stages of Acquisition Cognitive stage—full attention to instructions, models, feedback Associative stage—need cues, reminders for actions that are part of the skill Autonomous stage—motor programs using less attention; loss of the ability to verbalize process


Fitt’s Three-Stage Model of Skill Learning :24 Fitt’s Three-Stage Model of Skill Learning


4.2 Brain Substrates :4.2 Brain Substrates


Brain Substrates :26 Brain Substrates Neuroscientists hope to associate skill acquisition stages with changes in brain activity. Spinal cord and brainstem control and coordinate skill movements. Regions involved in sensation and perception (including sensory cortices) also involved in information processing during skill learning.


Brain Regions that Contribute to Skill Learning :27 Brain Regions that Contribute to Skill Learning


Basal Ganglia and Skill Learning :28 Basal Ganglia and Skill Learning Basal ganglia (BG)—clusters of neurons at base of forebrain, close to hippocampus Relay sensory information from cortex to thalamus and brain stem. Involved in activation and control of movement velocity, direction, and amplitude.


Learning Deficits after Lesions :29 Learning Deficits after Lesions Study findings show that BG is critical in learning that involves generating motor responses based on environmental cues.


Brain Activity during Cognitive Skill Learning :30 Brain Activity during Cognitive Skill Learning BG may enable skill learning, but specific role is unclear. Activation may reflect sensory cortical changes going into the BG.


Cortical Representation of Skills :31 Cortical Representation of Skills Mammals are highly trainable and use cerebral cortex extensively. Neuroimages show cortical regions involved in skill performance expand with extensive practice. Specific somatosensory cortex expansion in professional violinists. Jugglers showed 3 percent increase in gray matter of visual cortex area that responds to motion.


Are Skill Memories Stored in the Cortex? :32 Are Skill Memories Stored in the Cortex? Participants learned a finger movement skill. Power law performance pattern corresponded with motor cortex activation. Regional motor cortex activation expanded with later practice. Similar pattern in rats. Need further research in cortical and BG interactions during variety of skill learning.


Changes in Skill Performance and Associated Motor Cortex during Training :33 Changes in Skill Performance and Associated Motor Cortex during Training (a)Adapted from Karni et al., 1998. (b) Images © 1998 National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A


Learning and Memory in Everyday Life—Are Video Games Good for the Brain? :34 Learning and Memory in Everyday Life—Are Video Games Good for the Brain? Video game-playing proficiency requires perceptual-motor and cognitive skill development. College students who played high-action video games (at least 4 days a week for at least 6 months) increased visual attention abilities compared with a control group.


Learning and Memory in Everyday Life—Are Video Games Good for the Brain? :35 Learning and Memory in Everyday Life—Are Video Games Good for the Brain? Such skills may be transferable to other visual-motor abilities. Further research is needed on advantages and disadvantages of video game playing.


The Cerebellum and Timing :36 The Cerebellum and Timing Animals with little cortex (pigeons, fish) learn mazes or lever pressing. Cerebellum is important in encoding and retrieving skill memories. Has inputs from spinal cord, sensory systems and cerebral cortex. Has outputs to spinal cord and cortical motor systems. Important in learning precisely timed movement sequences (acrobatics, dancing).


The Cerebellum and Timing :37 The Cerebellum and Timing Rats that learned complicated motor tasks developed more cerebellar synapses. Compared to rats running an exercise wheel. Mirror tracing—copying a figure using a mirror image of the figure and one’s hand Involves tracking a target Patients with cerebellar damage have poorer performance, but equivalent learning rate, of a control group.


The Mirror Tracing Task :38 The Mirror Tracing Task Adapted from Laforce and Doyon, 2001.


Huntington’s Disease :39 Huntington’s Disease Huntington’s disease—inherited; causes damage to brain neurons (especially in BG and cerebral cortex) Results in: Psychological problems (mood disorders, hypersexuality, psychosis). Slow loss of motor abilities. Early facial twitching and progressive shaking of body parts.


Parkinson’s Disease :40 Parkinson’s Disease Parkinson’s disease—increasing muscular rigidity, tremors, difficulty initiating movements Reduction in brainstem neurons that modulate BG and cerebral cortex activity Decreased dopamine Difficulty learning serial reaction time and rotary pursuit tasks Can learn mirror reading


Parkinson’s Disease :41 Parkinson’s Disease Drug therapies and surgical procedures may temporarily relieve symptoms (e.g., deep brain stimulation to BG-cortical loop).