Musician’s hand dystonia (MD), a form of focal dystonia, is a movement disorder that is characterized by a loss of voluntary motor control of skilled hand movements during instrumental playing. Several studies have suggested that besides these task-specific movement problems, MD patients also show impaired timing and discrimination abilities. We employed a battery of auditory-motor tasks to investigate at what stage of auditory-motor processing deficits occur. In particular, we investigate sensorimotor synchronization, which is the capacity we use all the time when we tap along to a beat, play along with a metronome, and even it plays a role during ensemble music making.

• investigate the sensorimotor synchronization-abilities of MD patients compared to a matched control-group
• explore the relations between the different sensorimotor synchronization and perceptual tasks

In particular, we want to know whether MD patients

• benefit in their tapping when the pacing sequence adapts to their timing
• adapt and or anticipate to tempo changes in the same way control participants do
• show perceptual deficits

• Marieke van der Steen

• Floris van Vugt

• Peter Keller

• Eckart Altenmüller

• upcoming