THE TIME COURSE OF OFF-LINE FOR CONSOLIDATION IN IMPLICIT MOTOR SEQUENCE LEARNING IN YOUNG ADULTS.

Implicit skills learning such as riding a bicycle and playing a musical instrument play a central role in daily life. Such skills are learned gradually and are retained throughout life. The learning of motor skill occurs with practice, but skill can also increase between sessions, a process termed "off-line learning". In this research, Participants were tested on an implicit version of the Alternating Serial Reaction Time Task and re-tested 6, 24 or 72 h later. ANOVA revealed significant off-line motor skill improvement participants responding faster at the beginning of Session 2 than at the end of Session 1. The elapsed time between the two sessions influenced the improvement of motor skill improvements as well. Thus, participants' response speed improved more after the 24-, 72hr than after the 6-hr. The subsequent paired-samples t-tests conducted separately for all delay groups revealed that the off-line improvement of motor skill was significant in all groups (p< .05), and in all groups the 6, 24, 72-hr delay led to off-line enhancement (p< .05).This demonstrates that implicitly acquired skills can increase between sessions and the process occurs over hours. These findings are consistent with theoretical accounts of procedural skill learning such as the procedural reinstatement theory as well as with previous studies of retention of other motor skills. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]