Effect of Grasping Speed During Wearable Robotic Glove-Based Motor Imagery Training

Chaeeun Hwang, Jin Woo Choi, Sungho Jo

Abstract: Wearable robotic gloves have recently gained attention in the field of rehabilitation for their ability to support the movement of affected hands. One of the widely used rehabilitation methods for grasping is through action observation, where participants continuously monitor specific actions while thinking as if they were performing the bodily movements themselves. While previous studies claim that such a method, based on the mirror neuron system, may effectively induce brain activity related to corresponding movements, it is unclear how the speed of grasping movements may affect neural activity performance. In this paper, we conducted a preliminary study with healthy participants to investigate whether the speed of grasping from a wearable robotic glove may influence the motor imagery performance of users during action observation. Our results show that using a wearable robotic glove to demonstrate grasping movements improves motor imagery performance compared to when no movements are provided. Additionally, our experiment conveys that the grasping speed of the wearable glove has an impact on motor imagery performance. Our study highlights that detailed experimental designs, such as manipulating grasping speed for action observation, play an important role in rehabilitation.