observational learning

How Did My Shot Look? The Concealed Influence of Practicing With a Partner

Submitted by nicolah on 26. May 2024 - 13:33

Have you ever wondered how practicing with a partner or in a group would impact your own performance? Completing skills in shared environments can unintentionally influence the behaviours of people practicing together. One explanation for this influence is related to a hidden process in the brain that causes us to covertly imitate another’s action, which impacts how we then plan and execute our own movements. This study was conducted to test how partners influence each other when acquiring new skills and potential costs or benefits of these “hidden” imitation processes on motor learning.

Author: 
Porter Trevisan
Reference: 
Short-term evidence of partner-induced performance biases in simultaneous and alternating dyad practice in golf
Further reading: 
Learning together: Observation and other mechanisms which mediate shared practice contexts
Tags: 
dyad practice
motor learning
observational learning

Combining watching and doing: mixing practice methods is beneficial for motor learning

Submitted by nicolah on 24. May 2024 - 16:39

How can we make learning through physical practice more effective? A wealth of evidence suggests that watching others successfully performing a task can augment our own learning, when combined with physical practice. However, there is limited scientific guidance on the most effective way to combine observational and physical practice.

Image: 
Author: 
AnnaMae Pond
Reference: 
Combining Observation and Physical Practice: Benefits of an Interleaved Schedule for Visuomotor Adaptation and Motor Memory Consolidation
Further reading: 
Implicit adaptation processes promoted by immediate offline visual and numeric feedback
Updating of Implicit Adaptation Processes through Erroneous Numeric Feedback
What we imagine learning from watching others: how motor imagery modulates competency perceptions resulting from the repeated observation of a juggling action
Watch and Learn: Seeing Is Better than Doing when Acquiring Consecutive Motor Tasks
Mixing it up a little. How to schedule observational practice
Tags: 
learning
adaptation
observational learning
practice organization

Press pause for a reality check: Imagining performing motor skills tempers overconfidence from just watching.

Submitted by nicolah on 5. May 2024 - 22:19

It shouldn’t be surprising that to learn a new motor skill (a golf swing, perhaps?), that watching someone perform it a few times is a good place to start. However, our research here suggests that it might be worth taking a moment to imagine yourself performing the golf swing too, after watching, to give yourself a realistic notion of your present abilities. This

Author: 
Avi Mehrotra
Reference: 
What we imagine learning from watching others: how motor imagery modulates competency perceptions resulting from the repeated observation of a juggling action
Further reading: 
Enhancing motor imagery practice using synchronous action observation
Tags: 
observational learning
juggling
skill acquisition
practice
motor imagery

Limits to learning by observing: when learning by doing leads to differences in brain activity and behaviours in comparison to observation only

Submitted by nicolah on 30. May 2018 - 11:33
Practitioners often use “learning by observation” when teaching new skills; however, there is limited research on how the brain - behavioural responses compare with “learning by doing”. We compared the brain responses when performing and watching a novel joystick-tracing task in three groups: a physical practice group, an observational practice group and a group that had no practice. We then compared their behavioural performance during retention. Following physical practice when all groups watched a video of the task, there was activation in motor regions bilaterally.
Image: 
Image
Author: 
Nicola Hodges
Reference: 
Mu suppression is sensitive to observational practice but results in different patterns of activation in comparison with physical practice
Further reading: 
Action-skilled observation: Issues for the study of sport expertise and the brain
Tags: 
practice
observational learning
brain