Evidence for the dominance of visual-perceptual mechanisms of action prediction following isolated and sequential visual and motor practice

<p>We investigated how separately and sequentially acquired visual and motor experiences shape action prediction mecha-<br />nisms. There is evidence that physical practice leads to an implicit, motor-based prediction process, compared to visual<br />practice, which is more strategic. However, the relative dominance or flexibility of these mechanisms is not well under-<br />stood. Here we used a motor secondary task paradigm to evaluate effector-specific interference in action predictions,<br />which has previously given evidence for a motor simulation-based prediction process after physical practice. Participants<br />across two groups (N = 40) received both isolated and sequentially combined motor and visual practice across two days;<br />either throwing darts to three different sections of a dartboard &ldquo;motor&rdquo; or watching and predicting outcomes of occluded<br />throws &ldquo;visual&rdquo;. The Motor-to-Visual group threw on Day 1 and watched on Day 2 and the Visual-to-Motor group did the<br />reverse. Prediction tasks were performed pre and post practice each day, with some trials involving motor secondary tasks,<br />performed with the observed (right) or non-observed hand. Consistent with previous work, the Motor-to-Visual group<br />after physical practice improved prediction accuracy on Day 1, except when performing the secondary task with their<br />right hand. After visual practice on Day 2, prediction accuracy was maintained, but without secondary task interference.<br />The Visual-to-Motor group also improved predictions, but with no secondary task interference on either day, resulting in<br />greater accuracy overall. These data support the suggestion that separately acquired motor and visual experiences either<br />allow flexibility in prediction strategies or lead to a dominance of the visually-acquired strategy.</p>