Using the Wiimote to research the relationship between movement and cognition

Exploring Action Dynamics as an Index of Paired-Associate Learning (Dale et al)

The above article extends support for the relationship between movement and cognition (and cites a number of interesting articles that do the same). One rather unique and interesting aspect of this study is its methodology, in particular the decision to use Nintendo's Wii Remote (Wiimote) to measure movement during a learning task. Specifically, the aim of the above study was to measure various aspects of short-time-scale movements and investigate their possible correlation with longer-time-scale learning. Although the learning task was rather simplistic (association of symbolic pairs), the results indicated a strong relationship between movement and cognition. The researchers found that movement patterns changed predictably during the learning task and argue that movement patterns could be used as an index for measuring the success of the learner in the task at hand.