Browsing by Author "Streepey, Jake"

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    Application of Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation During Motor Skill Acquisition
    (2024-03) Meek, Anthony Wilhite; Riley, Zachary; Munk, Niki; Naugle, Kelly; Streepey, Jake
    Transcranial direct current stimulation has been used to influence the acquisition of motor skills; however, most studies investigate relatively simple laboratory based motor skills tasks. Since the regions where structural and functional changes support motor learning are dependent on the qualities of the task, translation of the findings to real-world skills has been limited. In general, anodal current stimulation is associated with functional facilitation and cathodal current is associated with functional inhibition. The purpose of this dissertation is to explore the effect of transcranial direct current stimulation of the primary motor cortex and the cerebellum upon the acquisition of novel motor skills that possess varied demands comparable to everyday tasks. In order to study motor skill learning, we investigated 4 unilateral tasks made novel by using the non-dominant hand, ensuring a discernible fast phase of learning in which to observe skill acquisition. In study one, anodal stimulation applied over the primary motor cortex during a 20 minute practice session skill acquisition in a complex dart throwing task compared to cathodal motor cortex stimulation or SHAM. In study two, 20 minutes of anodal motor cortical stimulation while practicing a dexterous tweezer task significantly reduced postpractice pin-placing time compared to SHAM. In study three, anodal motor cortical stimulation during 20 minutes practicing a dexterous rhythmic-timing video game led to significantly higher performance scores compared to SHAM. In study four, in the same videogame task, concurrently stimulating the primary motor cortex with 2 milliamp anodal current while stimulating the cerebellum with 2 milliamp cathodal current during 20 minutes of practice led to significantly higher performance scores compared to SHAM, whereas 2 milliamp anodal primary motor cortex, anodal cerebellar, and cathodal cerebellar stimulation alone was not different than SHAM. These data altogether show that motor cortical transcranial direct current stimulation can facilitate skill acquisition in everyday tasks with a range of gross, fine, and visuomotor demands. They also provide the first evidence of a synergistic effect on motor learning from concurrent primary motor cortex and cerebellar stimulation, which may contribute to the development of novel stimulation protocols.
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    The Effect of Music on Body Sway When Standing in a Moving Virtual Environment
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2016-04-08) Ladapo, Mosopefoluwa; Streepey, Jake; Smith, Benjamin
    Movement of the visual surrounding using virtual reality (VR) is an established tool for testing body sway for clinical and research purposes. There are, however, no conclusive studies showing the effects music can have on body sway especially if it is heard in conjunction with a shifting visual surrounding. For this study subjects stood quietly with their eyes closed, with their eyes open, and with their eyes open as they viewed a VR environment translating forward and backward at 0.1 Hz. In addition to these visual conditions, they simultaneously experienced “no sound” and music conditions. The music conditions consisted of their hearing a section of Mozart’s Jupiter and a section of the subjects’ self-selected popular music played normally and also modified so that the loudness and frequency shifted in sync with the VR movement. Body sway was assessed through analysis of center of pressure movement (COP) recorded with force plate, a commonly used device for assessing balance. To date, we have analyzed the body sway of one subject and have found, for that subject, that the addition music enhanced the effect of the translating scene on body sway as measured by increased COP variability, velocity, and a shift in median COP frequency. For this subject, however, it did not appear neither to make a difference whether the subject heard Mozart’s Jupiter or listened to their own self-selected music nor whether the music’s frequency or loudness was synced to the movement of the scene. Should these findings hold with further body sway analysis of more subjects, they would be of interest to clinicians and researchers examining the impact of sound on balance as well as to video game and computer graphics designers looking to create more immersive VR environments.
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    The influence of assistance in home-based exercise programs for individuals with intellectual disabilities
    (2017-03-08) Noerr, Kyra L.; Stanton-Nichols, Kathleen A.; Bahamonde, Rafael; Munk, Niki; Streepey, Jake; Swinford, Rachel
    Intellectual disability (ID) is considered a high-incidence disability affecting approximately 1.2 million adults in America (Brault, 2012). Diagnosed before the age of 18, ID is characterized by poor intellectual functioning, difficulty with adaptive behaviors, and problems with activities of daily living. Adaptive behaviors include practical, social and conceptual skills. Individuals with ID may lack the ability to personally care for themselves, self-direct and display naïve decision-making capabilities. Activities of daily living, such as maintaining one’s health, are influenced by poor adaptive behaviors. Between the years of 1997 and 2008, the prevalence of developmental disabilities, including ID, has increased 2.2% and while there is research dedicated to determining the risk factors causing ID, there is a continued need to research adaptive behavior management (Boyle et al., 2011). Current research in adaptive behavior focuses on determining best practices in order to help adults with ID thrive in schools, the workplace, home, and in the community. Adaptive behaviors related to healthcare, self-direction, and personal care still continue to be an area of adversity for the population and research on prevalence of healthcare-related problems are growing (Ervin & Merrick, 2014). Health concerns increase with the severity of the ID as well as age (Moss et al., 1993; Schrojenstein et al., 1997). Over 40% of adults with ID will develop four or more chronic diseases with an increase in age (Hsieh, Rimmer, & Heller, 2012). In the typical population, there is a plethora of evidence demonstrating that regular physical activity (PA) reduces the risk for chronic diseases, specifically all-cause mortality, colon and breast cancer, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, obesity, and depression (American College of Sports Medicine, 2013). However, the number of adults with ID participating in regular PA is considerably lower than the typical population. This lack of participation increases individual risk for secondary health conditions. With diminished capabilities in adaptive behaviors, there are significant issues that affect this population’s ability for self-care and independence in health-related care. Additionally, there are limited opportunities for individuals to take steps to improve his or her ability for self-care. Improving the availability of quality instruction for PA and adherence may increase overall PA and reduce incidence and prevalence of chronic disease in adults with ID.
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    Shock Absorption Properties of Soccer Headgear
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2015-04-17) Deer, Samantha; Riley, Jared; Streepey, Jake; Bahamonde, Rafael
    Soccer have gained tremendous success in the US with more than 3 million registered youth playing this year. With the concurrent increase of concussion awareness, manufactures of soccer apparel have introduced headgear to help dissipate forces from impacts with the ball as well as other surfaces such as body parts, ground, or goal posts. Most manufactures claim that such headgear can significantly reduce impact forces by as much of 50% during a collision. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to evaluate the shock absorption properties of three commercially available soccer headgear [Full Gear 90 (F90), Head blast soccer band (HB), and Forcefield headband (FF)]. A drop test was used to the simulate headsurface collision. A hard medicine ball weighing 2.5 kg was dropped from distance of 1 meter onto the surface of an AMTI force platform. The force platform recorded the magnitude of the force at a sampling rate of 1000 Hz. Ten trials for each conditions (no head gear-control, F90, HB and FF) were recorded and the impulse and maximum impact force were calculate using SigmaPlot. Oneway-ANOVA were used to determine significant differences in force and impulse across headgear. Although significant difference were found between the headgears for impulse and maximum force, overall these difference were minimal. There were less than a 10% reduction in maximum force and 4% reduction in impulse. Manufacturer’s claims of 50% reduction in impact forces seem to be unfounded. There is no scientific evidence that suggest that soccer headgear reduce the risk in injuries.
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    Validity of IPhone Apps to Measure Knee Range of Motion in Clinical Settings
    (Office of the Vice Chancellor for Research, 2015-04-17) Evans, Eric; Streepey, Jake; Bahamonde, Rafael
    Range of motion (ROM) of joints is a measure of musculoskeletal function in clinical and athletics settings. ROM in uniaxial joints is measured using a two-arm goniometer (GON). Although GON are inexpensive and can be used in different planes, there are limitation in accuracy and reproducibility. New IPhone apps have been developed to measure ROM using photography (PT tools, Dr.Goniometer and Photogoniometer), or the accelerometry and they also provide a permanent record of the measurement. The purpose of this study to compare the accuracy of the several IPhone apps against standard clinical [goniometer (GON)] and laboratory [electro-goniometer (EGON)] methods of measuring ROM. An EGON was attached the knee of 15 subjects knee while the performed five trials of knee extensionflexion). Three photography and one accelerometer based apps were compared against the EGON. The EGON data were compared against the GON used in clinical settings. Intraclass correlation (ICC) between methods and the Bland-Altman method (BAM) of assessing clinical agreement were used to determine validity. The ICC between the EGON and GON was r =.969 and with a BAM showing good clinical agreement between the two techniques. ICC of the photography based apps ranged from (.709-.721) and the accelerometer based goniometer was .671. The results of the BAM showed moderate to poor agreement between the methods, which indicate the some of the apps may not be suitable to use in clinical settings. The small screen size of the IPhone makes it difficult to accurately identify the joints centers. Small errors on placing the joint centers can lead to large errors of the knee joint angle. Accelerometer based apps are difficult to align and can be affected by muscle and adipose tissue of leg. It is possible that photography based apps when used on an IPad will provide better accuracy and be suitable to clinical settings.