Abstract
Mechanical and electrical noise stimulation to the body is known to improve the sensorimotor system. This improvement is related to stochastic resonance (SR), a phenomenon described as a “noise benefit” to various sensory and motor systems. The current study investigated the influence of SR on visuomotor temporal integration and hand motor function under delayed visual feedback in healthy young adults. The purpose of this study was to measure the usefulness of SR as a neurorehabilitation device for disorders of visuomotor temporal integration. Thirty healthy volunteers underwent detection tasks and hand motor function tests under delayed visual feedback, with or without SR. Of the 30 participants, 15 carried out the tasks under delayed visual feedback in the order of SR on-condition, off-condition, off-condition, and on-condition. The remaining 15 participants conducted the experimental tasks in the order of SR off-condition, on-condition, on-condition, and off-condition. Comparisons of the delay detection threshold (DDT), steepness of the delay detection probability curves, box and block test (BBT) scores, and nine-hole peg test (NHPT) scores between the SR on- and off-conditions were performed. The DDT under the SR on-condition was significantly shortened compared with the SR off-condition. There was no significant difference between the SR on- and off-conditions for the steepness of the delay detection probability curves, BBT scores, and NHPT scores. SR improved visuomotor temporal integration in healthy young adults, and may therefore improve movement disorders in patients with impaired visuomotor temporal integration. However, because the current results showed that SR did not improve hand motor function under delayed visual feedback, it may not improve motor function when a large distortion of visuomotor temporal integration is present. Further studies are required considering several limitations of the current study, and future clinical trials are necessary to verify the effects of motor training using SR for the treatment of visuomotor temporal integration disorders.
Highlights
Stochastic resonance (SR) is a phenomenon in which the response of a non-linear system to an input signal benefits from the presence of a particular non-zero level of noise [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]
The results showed that SR significantly shortened the delay detection threshold (DDT), which is an indicator of visuomotor temporal integration, and its effect size was moderate
The current study showed that SR improved visuomotor temporal integration; SR may improve movement disorders in subjects with deficits in visuomotor temporal integration by improving these deficits
Summary
Stochastic resonance (SR) is a phenomenon in which the response of a non-linear system to an input signal benefits from the presence of a particular non-zero level of noise [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9]. The effect of SR is hypothesized to be due the improvement of signal detection in the presence of noise; feedback controlled system performance has been demonstrated in theory [10] and in many biological systems [6, 7, 11,12,13]. The application of SR to visual input has been shown to improve contrast sensitivity and detection, the perception of figures, letter recognition, and depth perception [14,15,16,17]. SR has been demonstrated to improve tactile sensitivity in healthy individuals and patients with stroke [23,24,25]
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