Effects of force level and task difficulty on force control performance in elderly people
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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Effects of force level and task difficulty on force control performance in elderly people Caren Strote1 · Christian Gölz1 · Julia Kristin Stroehlein1 · Franziska Katharina Haase1 · Dirk Koester2,3 · Claus Reinsberger1 · Solveig Vieluf1 Received: 29 February 2020 / Accepted: 30 June 2020 © The Author(s) 2020
Abstract As the proportion of people over 60 years of age rises continuously in westernized societies, it becomes increasingly important to better understand aging processes and how to maintain independence in old age. Fine motor tasks are essential in daily living and, therefore, necessary to maintain. This paper extends the existing literature on fine motor control by manipulating the difficulty of a force maintenance task to characterize performance optima for elderly. Thirty-seven elderly (M = 68.00, SD = 4.65) performed a force control task at dynamically varying force levels, i.e. randomly changing every 3 s between 10%, 20%, and 30% of the individual’s maximum voluntary contraction (MVC). This task was performed alone or with one or two additional tasks to increase task difficulty. The force control characteristics accuracy, variability, and complexity were analyzed. Lowest variability was observed at 20%. Accuracy and complexity increased with increasing force level. Overall, increased task difficulty had a negative impact on task performance. Results support the assumption, that attention control has a major impact on force control performance in elderly people. We assume different parameters to have their optimum at different force levels, which remain comparably stable when additional tasks are performed. The study contributes to a better understanding of how force control is affected in real-life situations when it is performed simultaneously to other cognitive and sensory active and passive tasks. Keywords Force control · Elderly · Sensory motor task · Cognition · Entropy
Introduction Advanced age is associated with changes in behavioral outcomes and the loss of multiple fundamental abilities that affect the individual’s quality of life. One important ability that decreases with age is fine motor control, which is essential to many activities of daily living and often has to be performed simultaneously with other tasks. Beside others, force control is crucial for performance in fine motor tasks. The Communicated by Francesco Lacquaniti. * Solveig Vieluf [email protected] 1
Institute of Sports Medicine, Paderborn University, Warburger Str. 100, 33098 Paderborn, Germany
2
Department of Psychology and Sports Science, Bielefeld University, Universitätsstraße 25, Bielefeld 33615, Germany
3
Faculty Business and Management, BSP Business School Berlin, Calandrellistr. 1‑9, Berlin 12247, Germany
aim of the current study was to characterize performance optima for elderly by manipulating the difficulty of a force maintenance task in terms of task difficulty. Reaching and maintaining a certain force level depends on physiological and cognitive prerequisites. The musculo
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