Thumb Motor Performance is Greater for Two-Handed Grip Compared to Single-Handed Grip on a Mobile Phone

摘要

The aim of this study was to determine if thumb motor performance varied between singlehandedand two-handed grip for thumb tapping tasks on a mobile phone. A secondary aim was todetermine if differences in phone movement variation and thumb flexion could account forvariations in motor performance across the two grip configurations. Ten right-handed participants(5 males, 5 females) completed reciprocal thumb tapping tasks on an Apple iPhone 3? in asingle-handed and a two-handed grip configuration while an active-marker motion capture systemmeasured 3D kinematics of the thumb and phone. The results show that thumb motorperformance was significantly greater for the two-handed grip configuration due to less phonemovement variation compared to the single-handed grip configuration. Thumb flexion did notsignificantly vary across configurations. These data suggest that increasing support for the phonesuch as by using a two-handed grip could lead to increases in tapping performance. For example,increased performance would be expected when using phones that include a landscape mode andare wide enough to allow a stable two-handed grip.