A memory of errors in sensorimotor learning

Abstract

Practice makes perfect — or does it? How do we learn from past errors? Herzfeld et al. found that when we practice a movement, the human brain has a memory for errors that is then used to learn faster in new conditions. This memory for error exists in parallel with motor memory's two traditional forms: memory of actions and memory of external perturbations. They also proposed a mathematical model for learning from errors. This model explained previous experimental results and predicted other major findings that they later verified experimentally. Science , this issue p. 1349