While there has been recent successes in learning single control policies, there are several several open challenges in robot motor skill learning. Firstly, many motor tasks can be solved in multiple ways, and, hence, we need to be able to learn each of these solutions as separate options from which the agent can choose from. Furthermore, we need to learn how to adapt an option to the current s...

The improvement of a perceptual or motor skill continues after training has ended. The central question is whether this improvement is just a function of time or whether sleep, a certain circadian phase, or their interaction (sleep occurring in a particular circadian phase) is favorable to the reprocessing of recent memory traces. In this issue of Neuron, provide behavioral evidence that most o...

Recent years have seen significant progress in our understanding of the neural substrates of motor skill learning. Advances in neuroimaging provide new insight into functional reorganization associated with the acquisition, consolidation, and retention of motor skills. Plastic changes involving structural reorganization in gray and white matter architecture that occur over shorter time periods ...

One of the recent major developments in the understanding of motor skill learning in children has been the establishment of schema theory (Schmidt, 1975). Few theories of motor behavior have stimulated as much inquiry and had the general support from the scientific community as this notion. This article presented a synthesis of the theoretical framework and implications for program application ...

Experts in a skill produce movement-related cortical potentials (MRCPs) of smaller amplitude and later onset than novices. This may indicate that, following long-term training, experts require less effort to plan motor skill performance. However, no longitudinal evidence exists to support this claim. To address this, EEG was used to study the effect of motor skill training on cortical activity ...

The brain processes involved in the restoration of motor skill after hemiparetic stroke are not fully understood. The current study compared cortical activity in chronic stroke patients who successfully recovered hand motor skill and normal control subjects during performance of kinematically matched unskilled and skilled hand movements using functional magnetic resonance imaging. We found that...

This study measured skill acquisition in the presence and absence of guiding cues in pigeons. It asked whether the speed of development of autonomy for the motor skill is influenced by the difficulty level of two guiding-cue conditions requiring the same left-right response sequence. The Follow-Red condition required a simple go, no-go discrimination (red=S+, green=S-), whereas the Red-Green co...

This paper presents standardized norms of child development in Shiraz (Iran). A birth cohort of317 randomly selected neonates born at the 14 maternity clinics of Shiraz during 2 random consecutive weeks in 1996 were followed at homes for 2 years at 12 designed occasions and their development examined by 2 trained public health officers and a community medicine expert. In gross-motor and per...