Abstract
Circle-line drawing paradigm is used to study bimanual coupling. In the standard paradigm, subjects are asked to draw circles with one hand and lines with the other hand; the influence of the concomitant tasks results in two “elliptical” figures. Here we tested whether proprioceptive information evoked by muscle vibration inducing a proprioceptive illusion (PI) of movement at central level, was able to affect the contralateral hand drawing circles or lines. A multisite 80 Hz-muscle vibration paradigm was used to induce the illusion of circle- and line-drawing on the right hand of 15 healthy participants. During muscle vibration, subjects had to draw a congruent or an incongruent figure with the left hand. The ovalization induced by PI was compared with Real and Motor Imagery conditions, which already have proved to induce bimanual coupling. We showed that the ovalization of a perceived circle over a line drawing during PI was comparable to that observed in Real and Motor Imagery condition. This finding indicates that PI can induce bimanual coupling, and proprioceptive information can influence the motor programs of the contralateral hand.
Highlights
Circle-line drawing paradigm is used to study bimanual coupling
In this work we assessed whether the illusion of movement evoked by muscle vibration could induce bimanual interference on the contralateral hand performing an incongruent concurrent task
We compared the ovalization in the trajectory of the drawing performed with the left hand while performing/imagining to perform/perceiving the illusion of drawing lines or circles with the right hand
Summary
Circle-line drawing paradigm is used to study bimanual coupling. In the standard paradigm, subjects are asked to draw circles with one hand and lines with the other hand; the influence of the concomitant tasks results in two “elliptical” figures. We tested whether proprioceptive information evoked by muscle vibration inducing a proprioceptive illusion (PI) of movement at central level, was able to affect the contralateral hand drawing circles or lines. We showed that the ovalization of a perceived circle over a line drawing during PI was comparable to that observed in Real and Motor Imagery condition This finding indicates that PI can induce bimanual coupling, and proprioceptive information can influence the motor programs of the contralateral hand. Behavioural interference has been widely explored through the circle-line drawing task, a paradigm of bimanual coupling that requires to draw continuous circles with one hand and continuous lines with the other[4] Despite these sketches are easy when executed unimanually, when performed together they tend to influence each other, resulting in two “elliptical” figures.
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