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In this study, we developed an evaluation method using image analysis for reaching tasks. Using this method, we studied forearm function during the reaching task in rats that received a unilateral injection of 6-OHDA into the striatum. The success ratio of the reaching task reduced to 40.5% seven days after the injection. In addition, significant changes were observed in the pronation angle of the forearm, posture control, and targeting (i.e., the distance between all fingertips and the center of the target pellet). Thus, unilateral injection of 6-OHDA reduces dopaminergic function in the brain and causes deterioration of forearm function and posture control in the reaching task. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The use of digital technologies continues to increase in classrooms. For teachers, this involves an increased focus on the task design process for supporting student outcomes when using these technologies. Using the Activity Theory based Evaluation Version of the Activity Checklist as a theoretical framework, this paper explores an exemplary case of the use of the Activity Checklist through the analysis of a classroom task from the perspective of the teacher task design process. The results showed that the Activity Checklist as a framework was fruitful to capture and study the teacher design process as activities, illustrating important aspects in designing tasks for student work. It is concluded that the use of the Activity Checklist may support teachers' task design processes for motivating and supporting student outcomes related to the use of digital technologies. Further, the use of Activity Checklist can help to identify potential issues in the task design process from the teacher perspective, improve practitioners' work and in turn provide guiding principles for educational development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This research investigated the processing and integration of past painful/traumatic events using an expanded model of the Emotion Focused Therapy (EFT) task of Focusing. In previous research Harte proposed that processing emotional injuries by bringing previously incomplete memories back into awareness through activating felt sense, followed a particular sequence. The discovery phase of task analysis, a theory building research methodology, was used to develop a detailed model that revealed the steps of client change. Two sets of client participants were recruited. (1) Clients who reported they had experienced an emotional injury that resulted in emotional pain and had been engaged in therapy for some time and (2) trainee therapists in the role of client (bringing their own experiences) working with another trainee. A total of nine EFT trained therapists (26–57 years, mean = 44.25 years, five females and four males) worked with 11 clients (26–53 years, mean = 38.50 years, eight females and three males). Twelve single sessions were visually recorded, transcribed, and rigorously analyzed. A sequential three stage empirical model emerged from the discovery phase of the task analysis. The resultant empirical model describes a newly identified EFT task for processing emotional injuries in response to a felt sense of emotional pain (the marker). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The routines of information work are commonplace yet difficult to characterize. Although cognitive models have successfully characterized routine tasks within which there is little variation, a large body of ethnomethodological research has identified the inherent nonroutineness of routines in information work. We argue that work does not fall into discrete classes of routine versus nonroutine; rather, task performance lies on a continuum ofroutineness, and routineness metrics are important to the understanding of workplace multitasking. In a study of 10 information workers shadowed for 3 whole working days each, we utilize the construct of working sphere to model projects/tasks as a network of humans and artifacts. Employing a statistical technique called T-pattern analysis, we derive measures of routineness from these real-world data. In terms of routineness, we show that information workers experience archetypes of working spheres. The results indicate that T-patterns of interactions with information and computational media are important indicators of facets of routineness and that these measures are correlated with workers' affective states. Our results are some of the first to demonstrate how regular temporal patterns of media interaction in tasks are related to stress. These results suggest that designs of systems to facilitate so-called routine work should consider the degrees to which a person's working spheres fall along varying facets of routineness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The author discusses the aspects of the evidence-centered design (ECD). Topics discussed by the author include the assessment-design problems like the engineering-design problems, the roles for task model variables, and the proficiencies in the student model which described levels of competency with instructional relevance.