Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
Barrett, The Honors College at Arizona State University proudly showcases the work of undergraduate honors students by sharing this collection exclusively with the ASU community.
Barrett accepts high performing, academically engaged undergraduate students and works with them in collaboration with all of the other academic units at Arizona State University. All Barrett students complete a thesis or creative project which is an opportunity to explore an intellectual interest and produce an original piece of scholarly research. The thesis or creative project is supervised and defended in front of a faculty committee. Students are able to engage with professors who are nationally recognized in their fields and committed to working with honors students. Completing a Barrett thesis or creative project is an opportunity for undergraduate honors students to contribute to the ASU academic community in a meaningful way.
Filtering by
- Creators: Harrington Bioengineering Program
The purpose of this study is to know whether the primary motor cortex (M1) plays a role in the sensorimotor memory. It was hypothesized that temporary disruption of the M1 following the learning to minimize a tilt using a ‘L’ shaped object would negatively affect the retention of sensorimotor memory and thus reduce interference between the memory acquired in one context and the visual cues to perform the same task in a different context.
Significant findings were shown in blocks 1, 2, and 4. In block 3, subjects displayed insignificant amount of learning. However, it cannot be concluded that there is full interference in block 3. Therefore, looked into 3 effects in statistical analysis: the main effects of the blocks, the main effects of the trials, and the effects of the blocks and trials combined. From the block effects, there is a p-value of 0.001, and from the trial effects, the p-value is less than 0.001. Both of these effects indicate that there is learning occurring. However, when looking at the blocks * trials effects, we see a p-value of 0.002 < 0.05 indicating significant interaction between sensorimotor memories. Based on the results that were found, there is a presence of interference in all the blocks but not enough to justify the use of TMS in order to reduce interference because there is a partial reduction of interference from the control experiment. It is evident that the time delay might be the issue between context switches. By reducing the time delay between block 2 and 3 from 10 minutes to 5 minutes, I will hope to see significant learning to occur from the first trial to the second trial.
Sensorimotor adaptation is a type of learning that allows sustaining accurate movements by adjusting motor output. This allows the brain to adapt to temporary changes when engaged in a certain task. Within sensorimotor adaptation, visuomotor adaptation (VMA) is one’s ability to correct a visual perturbation. In this study, we present preliminary results on the effects of VMA with the control group, compared to groups undergoing trigeminal nerve stimulation (TNS) or SHAM (placebo) effects. Twenty-two healthy subjects with no past medical history participated in this study. Subjects performed a visuomotor rotation task, which required gradually adapting to a perturbation between hand motion and corresponding visual feedback. Five total blocks were completed: two familiarization blocks, one baseline block, one rotation block with a 30◦ counterclockwise rotation, and one washout block with no rotation. The control group performed better than the 120 Hz (TNS) and SHAM groups due to less directional error (DE) on the respective learning curves. Additionally, the control group adapted faster (less DE) than the SHAM groups that either felt stimulation, or did not feel the stimulation. The results yield new information regarding VMA which can be used in the future when comparing sensorimotor adaptation and its many applications.