Effects of Massed and Distributed Practice, Additional Monetary and Placebo Incentives, and Changes in Characteristics of Control Element during Learning of Human Motor Control

Abstract

15 male Ss were tested in a pursuit tracking test with forcing functions of fixed and adaptively changing levels of difficulty. The influence of various factors during learning has been evaluated by a continuous scoring method (integrated absolute error). There was significantly better performance under distributed than massed practice, significantly positive influences of an additional monetary incentive, and deleterious effects of a change in the regime of practice. Over-all results give some hints for the limits of validity of time-invariant models of human control behavior.