Abstract
Rhythmic movements occur in many aspects of daily life. Examples include clapping the hands and walking. The production of two independent rhythms with multiple limbs is considered to be extremely difficult. In the present study we evaluated whether two different, independent rhythms that involved finger tapping and walking could be produced. In Experiment I, twenty subjects that had no experience of musical instrument training performed rhythmic finger tapping with the right index finger and one of four different lower limb movements; (1) self-paced walking, (2) given-paced walking, (3) alternative bilateral heel tapping from a sitting position, and (4) unilateral heel tapping with the leg ipsilateral to the tapping finger from a sitting position. The target intervals of finger tapping and heel strikes for walking step/heel tapping were set at 375 ms and 600 ms, respectively. The even distribution of relative phases between instantaneous finger tapping and heel strike was taken as the criteria of independency for the two rhythms. In the self-paced walking and given-paced walking tasks, 16 out of 20 subjects successfully performed finger tapping and walking with independent rhythms without any special practice. On the other hand, in the bipedal heels striking and unipedal heel striking tasks 19 subjects failed to perform the two movements independently, falling into interrelated rhythms with the ratio mostly being 2:1. In Experiment II, a similar independency of finger tapping and walking at a given pace was observed for heel strike intervals of 400, 600, and 800 ms, as well as at the constant 375 ms for finger tapping. These results suggest that finger tapping and walking are controlled by separate neural control mechanisms, presumably with a supra-spinal locus for finger tapping, and a spinal location for walking.
Highlights
Rhythmic movements occur in many aspects of daily life
Inter-tap intervals tended to deviate from, and became lower than, the target (375 ms, dashed line). This was evident for the bipedal heels striking and unipedal heel striking tasks
(CV) of the inter-strike interval (Fig. 2C), a significant interaction was found across the tasks (F[4, 76] = 33.780, p = 0.00) and coefficient of variation (CV) of the walking, self-paced walking and given-paced walking tasks were significantly lower than those of the bipedal heels striking tasks (p = 0.00 with both self-paced walking task and given-paced walking task) and unipedal heel tasks and unipedal heel striking tasks (p = 0.00 with both self-paced walking task and given-paced walking tasks)
Summary
Rhythmic movements occur in many aspects of daily life. Examples include clapping the hands and walking. Rhythmic movements do not always occur alone, and in complex situations, like playing a drum set, two or more rhythms are performed simultaneously. Rhythmic movements such as finger tapping are related to neural mechanisms located in supra-spinal structures[1]. Whether or not independent polyrhythmic movements with multiple limbs are truly impossible in any situation remains unclear Another model system used to study rhythmic movements involves locomotion. Performing two independent rhythms might be possible if one rhythm involves finger tapping (controlled by supra-spinal structures), and the other rhythm involves walking This latter movement entails a lower-limb movement that is mainly controlled by circuits in the spinal cord
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