Elaborate force coordination of precision grip could be generalized to bimanual grasping techniques

Exceptional coordination of grip (G; the normal force that prevents slippage of the grasped object) and load force (L; the tangential force originating from the object's weight and inertia) has been interpreted as a part of evidence that both the anatomy and neural control of human hands have been predominantly designed for manipulation tasks. In the present study, we tested the hypothesis that the precision grasp (uses only the tips of fingers and the thumb of one hand) provides better indices of G and L coordination in static manipulation tasks than two bimanual grasps (palm-palm and fingers-thumb; both using opposing segments of two hands). However, in addition to a subtle difference in relative timing of G and L between the precision and two bimanual grasps, we only found that the fingers-thumb grasp is characterized with higher G/L ratio and somewhat higher modulation of G than not only the precision, but also the bimanual palm-palm grasp. However, all remaining data including the correlation coefficients between G and L demonstrated no difference among three evaluated grasping techniques. Therefore, we concluded that the elaborate G and L coordination associated with uni-manual grasps could be partly generalized to a variety of manipulation tasks including those based on bimanual grasping techniques. Taking into account the importance of manipulation tasks in both everyday life and clinical evaluation, future studies should extend the present research to both other grasping techniques and dynamic manipulation conditions. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.