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Performance limitations from delay in human and mechanical motor control

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Abstract

We discuss natural limitations on motor performance caused by the time delay required for feedback signals to propagate within the human body or mechanical control systems. By considering a very simple delayed linear servomechanism model, we show there exists a best possible speed-accuracy trade-off similar to Fitts’ law that cannot be exceeded when delay is present. This is strictly a delay effect and does not occur for the ideal case of instantaneous feedback. We then examine the performance of the vector integration to endpoint (VITE) circuit as a model of human movement and show that when this circuit is generalized to include delayed feedback the performance may not exceed that of the servomechanism with an equal delay. We suggest the existence of such a limitation may be a ubiquitous consequence of delay in motor control with the implication that the index of performance in Fitts’ law cannot arbitrarily large.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Chinese Academy of Science, Academy of Mathematics and Systems Science, Beijing, China

    Dan Beamish & Zhujun Jing

  2. Department of Biology, York University, Toronto, Canada

    Shabana Bhatti

  3. Laboratory for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, York University, Toronto, Canada

    Jianhong Wu

Authors
  1. Dan Beamish
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  2. Shabana Bhatti
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  3. Jianhong Wu
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  4. Zhujun Jing
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Correspondence to Dan Beamish.

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Beamish, D., Bhatti, S., Wu, J. et al. Performance limitations from delay in human and mechanical motor control. Biol Cybern 99, 43–61 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00422-008-0235-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00422-008-0235-z

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