THE GENERATION OF THE EFFERENT COMMAND AND THE IMPORTANCE OF JOINT COMPLIANCE IN FAST ELBOW MOVEMENTS

We describe the effects of changing an elastic or inertial load on the trajectory and EMG patterns during fast, voluntary elbow flexions. Th ese effects depend upon whether the load is known to the subject in ad vance of the movement or is only determined as the movement is perform ed. The EMG patterns change in a well-defined manner when the load is known in advance. When the load change is unexpected, the change in th e EMG patterns is smaller and later and the effects on the trajectory are greater. In neither case did the loads used here have large effect s. We show that joint compliant properties are responsible for minimiz ing the effects of external load changes on the trajectory. We conclud e that there is no evidence for a large contribution by length-sensiti ve stretch reflexes to this process.