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Preserving Agency During Electrical Muscle Stimulation Training Speeds up Reaction Time Directly After Removing EMS

Shunichi Kasahara,Kazuma Takada,Jun Nishida,Kazuhisa Shibata,S. Shimojo,Pedro Lopes

Published 2021 in International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

ABSTRACT

Abstract: Force feedback devices, such as motor-based exoskeletons or wearables based on electrical muscle stimulation (EMS), have the unique potential to accelerate users’ own reaction time (RT). However, this speedup has only been explored while the device is attached to the user. In fact, very little is known regarding whether this faster reaction time still occurs after the user removes the device from their bodies–this is precisely what we investigated by means of a simple reaction time (RT) experiment, in which participants were asked to tap as soon as they saw an LED flashing. Participants experienced this in three EMS conditions: (1) fast-EMS, the electrical impulses were synced with the LED; (2) agency-EMS, the electrical impulse was delivered 40ms faster than the participant’s own RT, which prior work has shown to preserve one’s sense of agency over this movement; and, (3) late-EMS: the impulse was delivered after the participant’s own RT. Our results revealed that the participants’ RT was significantly reduced by approximately 8ms (up to 20ms) only after training with the agency-EMS condition. This finding suggests that the prioritizing agency during EMS training is key to motor-adaptation, i.e., it enables a faster motor response even after the user has removed the EMS device from their body.

PUBLICATION RECORD

  • Publication year

    2021

  • Venue

    International Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

  • Publication date

    2021-05-06

  • Fields of study

    Computer Science, Engineering

  • Identifiers
    DOI 10.1145/3411764.3445147
  • External record

    Open on Semantic Scholar

  • Source metadata

    Semantic Scholar

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