X-Message-Number: 4091
From:  (David Stodolsky)
Subject: Fwd: "Normal" Movement: BBS Call for Commentators
Date: Sun, 26 Mar 95 10:36:42 +0100 (CET)


Forward of letter <> from Behavioral and 
Brain Sciences (BBS) <>:

From: Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS) <>
Date: Fri, 17 Mar 95 13:17:16 GMT
To: 
Subject: "Normal" Movement: BBS Call for Commentators

    Below is the abstract of a forthcoming target article on:

            "NORMAL MOVEMENTS" IN ATYPICAL POPULATIONS
                           by
             Mark Latash & J. Greg Anson

This article has been accepted for publication in Behavioral and Brain
Sciences (BBS), an international, interdisciplinary journal providing
Open Peer Commentary on important and controversial current research in
the biobehavioral and cognitive sciences.

Commentators must be current BBS Associates or nominated by a current
BBS Associate. To be considered as a commentator for this article, to
suggest other appropriate commentators, or for information about how to
become a BBS Associate, please send email to:

 or write to:

    Behavioral and Brain Sciences
    Department of Psychology
    University of Southampton
    Highfield, Southampton
    SO17 1BJ UNITED KINGDOM
    
To help us put together a balanced list of commentators, please give
some indication of the aspects of the topic on which you would bring
your areas of expertise to bear if you were selected as a commentator.
An electronic draft of the full text is available for inspection by
anonymous ftp (or gopher or world-wide-web) according to the
instructions that follow after the abstract.
____________________________________________________________________

        WHAT ARE "NORMAL MOVEMENTS" IN ATYPICAL POPULATIONS?

                Mark L. Latash
                Department of Exercise and Sport Science
                Pennsylvania State University
                University Park, PA 16802, USA
                

                J. Greg Anson
                University of Otago
                Dunedin, New Zealand

    ABSTRACT: Redundancy of the motor control system gives the central
    control structures options for solving everyday motor problems. The
    choice of particular control patterns is based on priorities
    (coordinative rules) that are presently unknown. Motor patterns
    observed in unimpaired young adults reflect these priorities. We
    hypothesize that in certain atypical conditions, which may include
    disorders in perception of the environment and decision-making,
    structural or biochemical changes within the central nervous
    system, and/or structural changes of the effectors, the central
    nervous system may reconsider its priorities. A new set of
    priorities will reflect the current state of the system and may
    lead to different patterns of voluntary movement. In such
    conditions, changed motor patterns should be considered not
    pathological but rather adaptive to a primary disorder and may even
    be viewed as optimal for a given state of the system of movement
    production. Therapeutic approaches should not be directed towards
    restoring the motor patterns to as close to "normal" as possible
    but rather towards resolving the original underlying problem. We
    illustrate this approach with movements in amputees and patients
    with Parkinson's disease, dystonia, and Down syndrome.

    KEYWORDS: Voluntary Movement, Motor Control, Movement Disorders,
    Coordination, Posture, Pre-programming, Parkinson's disease, Down
    syndrome

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