I read this manuscript with interest and the results look interesting. The manuscript presents what seems a well conducted experiment. In the present study the authors investigated the impact of a 2-week training regimen on the facilitation of individuated finger movements by startling acoustic stimuli. To my knowledge, this is the second (see Maslovat et al., 2011) study to look at the effect of training over a relatively extended period of time on the StartReact effect. I rate this manuscript favourably but have several suggestions, particularly regarding the interpretation of the results, to improve the paper. Line 32-34: "Still, individuated movements of the hands are not susceptible to startle-evoked movement (SEM) which indicates …show more content…
Ready and Go signal are both auditory, thus referring to No Stimulus trials when you have a soft Go signal is misleading. Perhaps simply say soft and loud Go signals. Methods: I like short reports but for replication purposes it would be ideal to provide more details in the methods section. For example, was the loud sound delivered via the computer speakers? How did you measure the intensity of the acoustic stimuli? What is the duration of the acoustic stimulus? Rise time? An indication of the number of trials analysed and lost would be helpful too. What is LSCM? I can guess left SCM but you must spell it out the first time, and same for RSCM. Line 149-154: This is a bit confusing (perhaps just to me): "... an action is declared susceptible to SEM". Is the action susceptible to the startle-evoked movement? I would revise this throughout the whole paper. Line 161: You are hypothesizing a null-effect here. If you really want to do that, then you should use Bayesian statistics and collect data until you have strong evidence for the null. That's not how NHST works and with only 9 participants things are even more complicated. Confidence intervals and estimates of effect sizes would be preferred if you don't want to go Bayesian. Line 184: a p-value of p=0.09 does not indicate a trend. If you want to talk about a trend just fit a simple regression line to each individual's data across the testing days and see if the average slope is different from zero.
5. Restate your predictions that were correct and give the data from your experiment that supports them. Restate your predictions that were not correct and correct them, giving the data from your experiment that supports the correction.
However, treatment four, 0.1296 (±0.608), represents that the mean was extraneous from what it should be (Table 1). The t-tests show how different the mean is in each treatment.
3. Considering your answers to Questions 1 and 2, why did activity in Annie’s motor nerves produce a skeletal muscle response that fatigued during repetitive stimulation?
All the p-values are greater than 0.05, therefore there is a statistical difference between each transect.
In this classical conditioning experiment, the tapping of the person’s knee with a clinical hammer is the UCS, as it is a naturally occurring stimulus that elicits the UCR, which in this case is the reflexive knee jerk action. The distinctive sound given out by the buzzer was initially the NS, but eventually became the CS, after 20 to 30 pairings with the UCS within close intervals of 5 seconds during the experiment. It has become a stimulus that is subsequently capable of eliciting a learned reflex response on its own (CR) which was originally an UCR, because it has been paired with the original UCS.
With a P-value of 0.00, we have a strong level of significance. No additional information is needed to ensure that the data given is accurate.
The null hypothesis is rejected since the p-value is below the significance level of 0.05.
Startle reflex- when babies hear a sudden sound or see a bright light, they move their arms outwards, and clenching their fists
P-value represents a decimal between 1.0 to below .01. Unfortunately, the level of commonly accepted p-value is 0.05. The level of frequency of P>0.05 means that there is one in twenty chance that the whole study is just accidental. In other words, that there is one in twenty chance that a result may be positive in spite of having no actual relationship. This value is an estimate of the probability that the result has occurred by statistical accident. Thus, a small value of P represents a high level of statistical significance and vice
Encyclopedia of Nursing & Allied Health. Bioelectricity: Transmission of nerve impulses to muscle. Retrieved on 26 June 2011 from http://www.enotes.com/nursing-encyclopedia/bioelectricity
Review Sheet Results 1. Describe how increasing the stimulus frequency affected the force developed by the isolated whole skeletal muscle in this activity. How well did the results compare with your prediction? Your answer: When the stimulus frequency was at the lowest the force was at its lowest level out of all of the experiments. As the stimulus frequency was increased to 130, s/s the force increased slightly but fused tetanus developed at the higher frequency. When the stimulus frequency was increased to the amounts of 146-150 s/s, the force reached a plateau and maximal tetanic tension occurred, where no further increases in force occur from additional stimulus frequency. 2. Indicate what type of force was developed by the isolated skeletal muscle in this activity at the following stimulus frequencies: at 50 stimuli/sec, at 140 stimuli/sec, and above 146 stimuli/sec. Your answer: At 50- Unfused
Conclusion : Fails to reject the null hypothesis. The sample does not provide enough evidence to support the claim that mean is significantly different from 12 .
We have a series of reflexes throughout the body that support us and naturally co-ordinate our movements, yet we interfere with these
The ascending trials for each body part, with the exception of the second trial of the forearm, did not vary far from the mean threshold. When the second trial of forearm stimulation was given to the participant, there was a point in time (near the middle of administration) in which the experimenter accidentally placed the dial caliber tips onto the participant’s skin at two separate times. This caused the participant to report feeling the stimulus as separate earlier than she did in the first and third forearm trials. Because of this error, the mean two-point threshold of the forearm was not as reliable as it could have been had there been no error in the deliverance of stimuli. The purpose of this lab was, in fact, achieved and the participant’s two-point threshold means were calculated.
The tapping rate is a psychological test given to assess the integrity of the neuromuscular system and examine motor control. The finger tapping test has the advantage of being a relatively pure neurologically driven motor task because the inertial and intersegment interactions are so small that biomechanical influences on movement are reduced. Finger tapping involves three important features: time, spatial amplitude, and frequency. Studies have reported that the average number of taps per 10-second interval can be used to distinguish between patients with mild traumatic brain injury and healthy controls, is slower in people one month after sustaining a mild traumatic brain injury,]and in experienced boxers and soccer players who frequently "headed" the ball. The speed of finger tapping has also been found to be related to severity of initial traumatic brain injury, and can be used to help assess recovery from mild and moderate traumatic brain injuries