effects of limb-specific fatigue on motor learning during an upper extremity proprioceptive task

Background: the effects of limbspecific fatigue on motor skill acquisition and retention are not clear.objective: to investigate the impact of limbspecific fatigue on the acquisition and retention of an upper extremity proprioceptive task.methods: twentytwo righthanded participants were randomly and equally assigned to either fatigued or nonfatigued protocols. acquisition phase for the upper extremity task consisted of 5 blocks each with 12 trials. after 48 hours, all participants performed 1 block retention test (12 trials) with the left arm followed by 1 block transfer test (12 trials) with the right arm. performance for each block was analyzed using a oneway analysis of variance (anova). performance differences between groups for the acquisition was analyzed using a 2 x 5 (group x block) anova with repeated measures on the blocks. the performance on retentiontransfer was analyzed by separate anovas. statistical significance set at p < .05.results: the fatigued condition displayed significantly more e than the nonfatigue group (p < .05). during retention and transfer, the fatigue group again displayed higher e compared to the nonfatigued group (p < .05).conclusion: the results of this study support that limbspecific fatigue may produce performance deficits during acquisition and interfere with motor skill retention.