Motorized Shoes Induce Robust Sensorimotor Adaptation in Walking

The motor system has the flexibility to update motor plans according to systematic changes in the environment or the body. This capacity is studied in the laboratory through sensorimotor adaptation paradigms imposing sustained and predictable motor demands specific to the task at hand. However, these studies are tied to the laboratory setting. Thus, we asked if a portable device could be used to elicit locomotor adaptation outside the laboratory. To this end, we tested the extent to which a pair of motorized shoes could induce similar locomotor adaptation to split-belt walking, which is a well-established sensorimotor adaptation paradigm in locomotion. We specifically compared the adaptation effects (i.e. after-effects) between two groups of young, healthy participants walking with the legs moving at different speeds by either a split-belt treadmill or a pair of motorized shoes. The speeds at which the legs moved in the split-belt group was set by the belt speed under each foot, whereas in the motorized shoes group were set by the combined effect of the actuated shoes and the belts’ moving at the same speed. We found that the adaptation of joint motions and measures of spatial and temporal asymmetry, which are commonly used to quantify sensorimotor adaptation in locomotion, were indistinguishable between groups. We only found small differences in the joint angle kinematics during baseline walking between the groups – potentially due to the weight and height of the motorized shoes. Our results indicate that robust sensorimotor adaptation in walking can be induced with a paired of motorized shoes, opening the exciting possibility to study sensorimotor adaptation during more realistic situations outside the laboratory.