The Effects of Movement Speed and Initial Position on Movement Reproduction Accuracy

Abstract

This study examined two different cues that might be used in the reproduction of movement: (1) the initial position of the movement and (2) the terminal location of the movement. An experiment was designed to assess the relative importance of these two cues using the kinesthesia subtest of the Southern California Sensory Integration Tests with 48 college juniors A 2 × 2 factorial design was used One factor, speed of movement, had two levels, fast and slow, as did the other factor, angle of approach—altered approach or original approach. The dependent measures were distance error from the target and angle error. The results suggested that angle of approach was not an important variable in reproduction of movement. However, a significant effect ( p<05) was found for speed of movement, indicating that fast movements caused a significantly larger error in direction than did slow movements These data imply that the terminal location of a movement is the more salient cue, independent of the extent or angle of the movement.