The purpose of this project is to investigate whether a 3-week training program involving music beat (serving as a type of rhythmic auditory stimulation) reduces the severity of bradykinesia and dyskinesia in at-risk individuals and schizophrenia patients. It is hypothesized that the program is effective in reducing the severity of bradykinesia and dyskinesia in at-risk individuals and schizophrenia patients.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
TREATMENT
Masking
SINGLE
Enrollment
15
The song named 'Sign of The Times' is played and recorded by the research personnel beforehand. The beat of the song will serve as RAS. The computer software "Audacity" will be used to adjust tempi of RAS. Before intervention, the participant is required to execute the movement task without the aid of RAS as quickly as possible for 30 seconds, so that we obtain his/her baseline movement tempo. For each 40-minute training session in the first training week, three RAS tempi will be provided for the first, second, and last 10 minutes with a five-minute break in between: normal (100% of the baseline tempo), quick (105% of the baseline tempo), and fast (110% of the baseline tempo). With each training week, the three RAS tempi will be increased by 5%. Participants in the experimental groups are required to use their right hand to pick up beads from source bowls to the target bowl when listening to the song. The 3-week intervention program will include 21 40-minute daily training sessions.
The training protocol will be the same as that used in the experimental group except the lack of RAS during execution of the movement task.
ST814, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University
Kowloon, Hong Kong
Motion analysis by using an eight-camera motion capture system (VICON; Oxford Metrics Group, Oxford, UK)
normalized movement time (representing severity of bradykinesia). Unit: second/mm
Time frame: Within one week right before the 1st session of the intervention
Motion analysis by using an eight-camera motion capture system (VICON; Oxford Metrics Group, Oxford, UK)
normalized movement time (representing severity of bradykinesia). Unit: second/mm
Time frame: Within one week right after the last session of the intervention
Motion analysis by using an eight-camera motion capture system (VICON; Oxford Metrics Group, Oxford, UK)
normalized number of movement units (representing severity of dyskinesia). Unit: units/mm
Time frame: Within one week right before the 1st session of the intervention
Motion analysis by using an eight-camera motion capture system (VICON; Oxford Metrics Group, Oxford, UK)
normalized number of movement units (representing severity of dyskinesia). Unit: units/mm
Time frame: Within one week right after the last session of the intervention
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