Motor Control & Learning

Catalog description

This course is a capstone course for the BS in Kinesiology degree. It provides students with a holistic overview of current theoretical and applied perspectives in the field of motor control and learning and discusses their implications for kinesiology and for physical therapy. The course will primarily be focused at the behavioral level of analysis and thus will complement the neurophysiological approach taken in PT 450 . A major emphasis in this course will be to compare and contrast the theoretical approaches of information processing and dynamic systems in the understanding of both normal and pathological human motor behavior. Implications for the analysis and treatment of movement disorders stemming from both approaches will be examined. This analysis will allow students to constructively criticize current assumptions underlying motor control for motor performance and neurological rehabilitation, and to understand how theoretical frameworks bias evaluation and treatment options. Given a theoretical understanding of past and current approaches to motor control and learning, students will be able to flexibly design their own exercise and treatment approaches. Students will be required to design and conduct an experiment using current computerized technology in an attempt to answer an applied or basic science motor control question. The data from the experiment will be analyzed and written up as if it were to be submitted for publication in a motor control/learning journal. Students will also present their research to the class on completion of the experiment. Prerequisite(s): PT 411 .