The reliance on visual feedback for online and offline processing

The objective of the current study was to determine whether the reliance on visual feedback that develops with practice is to due utilizing vision to adjust trajectories during movement execution (i.e., online) and/or to enhance the programming of subsequent trials (i.e., offline). Participants performed a directional aiming task with either vision during the movement, dynamic feedback of the trajectory of the movement or the movement endpoint. The full vision condition was more accurate during practice than the other feedback conditions but suffered a greater decrement in performance when feedback was removed. In addition, the reliance on trajectory feedback was greater compared with the endpoint feedback. It appears that the reliance on visual feedback that develops with practice was due to both online and offline processing.