Strategy preference in complex dynamical tasks: preliminary results

Many complex activities of daily living are characterized by instabilities. From a motor control point of view, there are two alternative stabilization mechanisms that require to integrate multi-joint coordination aspects: stiffness and positional stabilization strategies. The aim of this work is to understand how the central nervous system can switch between the two control paradigms, depending on the dynamic properties of the environment. This study reports the performance of healthy participants trained to master both strategies and, in particular, it shows how it is possible to quantitatively assess the individual strategy preference when specific environmental factors are introduced.