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Investigating the Role of Feedback and Motivation in Clinical Reaction Time Assessment
Author(s) -
Eckner James T.,
Chandran SriKrishna,
Richardson James K.
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
pmandr
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.617
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1934-1563
pISSN - 1934-1482
DOI - 10.1016/j.pmrj.2011.04.022
Subject(s) - medicine , likert scale , physical therapy , test (biology) , visual analogue scale , observational study , audiology , psychology , developmental psychology , paleontology , biology
Objective To investigate the influence of performance feedback and motivation during 2 tests of simple visuomotor reaction time (RT). Design Cross‐sectional, observational study. Setting Outpatient academic physiatry clinic. Participants Thirty‐one healthy adults (mean [SD], 54 ± 15 years). Methods Participants completed a clinical test of RT (RT clin ) and a computerized test of RT with and without performance feedback (RT compFB and RT compNoFB , respectively) in randomly assigned order. They then ranked their degree of motivation during each test. RT clin measured the time required to catch a suspended vertical shaft by hand closure after release of the shaft by the examiner. RT compFB and RT compNoFB both measured the time required to press a computer key in response to a visual cue displayed on a computer monitor. Performance feedback (visual display of the previous trial and summary results) was provided for RT compFB , but not for RT compNoFB . Main Outcome Measurements Means and standard deviations of RT clin , RT compFB , and RT compNoFB and participants' self‐reported motivation on a 5‐point Likert scale for each test. Results There were significant differences in both the means and standard deviations of RT clin , RT compFB , and RT compNoFB (F 2,60 = 81.66, P < .0001; F 2,60 = 32.46, P < .0001, respectively), with RT clin being both the fastest and least variable of the RT measurements. RT clin was more strongly correlated with RT compFB ( r = 0.449, P = .0011) than with RT compNoFB ( r = 0.314, P = .086). The participants reported similar levels of motivation between RT clin and RT compFB , both of which were reported to be more motivating than RT compNoFB . Conclusions The stronger correlation between RT clin and RT compFB as well as the higher reported motivation during RT clin and RT compFB testing suggest that performance feedback is a positive motivating factor that is inherent to RT clin testing. RT clin is a simple, inexpensive technique for measuring RT and appears to be an intrinsically motivating task. This motivation may promote faster, more consistent RT performance compared with currently available computerized programs, which do not typically provide performance feedback.