Sili D, De Giorgi C, Pizzuti A, Spezialetti M, de Pasquale F, Betti V. The spatio-temporal architecture of everyday manual behavior.
Sci Rep 2023;
13:9451. [PMID:
37296243 PMCID:
PMC10256758 DOI:
10.1038/s41598-023-36280-4]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/20/2023] [Accepted: 05/31/2023] [Indexed: 06/12/2023] Open
Abstract
In everyday activities, humans move alike to manipulate objects. Prior works suggest that hand movements are built by a limited set of basic building blocks consisting of a set of common postures. However, how the low dimensionality of hand movements supports the adaptability and flexibility of natural behavior is unknown. Through a sensorized glove, we collected kinematics data from thirty-six participants preparing and having breakfast in naturalistic conditions. By means of an unbiased analysis, we identified a repertoire of hand states. Then, we tracked their transitions over time. We found that manual behavior can be described in space through a complex organization of basic configurations. These, even in an unconstrained experiment, recurred across subjects. A specific temporal structure, highly consistent within the sample, seems to integrate such identified hand shapes to realize skilled movements. These findings suggest that the simplification of the motor commands unravels in the temporal dimension more than in the spatial one.
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