When we step onto a moving escalator, an increase of walking velocity before the stepping action would be required for additional propulsion for the stabilization of posture after the action.
Next, if the values showed the significant differences between SE1 and WS1 conditions, mean data were analyzed with a two-way ANOVA with session (sessions A and B) and trial order (first, second, third trials after trials of moving escalator) as within-participant factors.
The results show that moving escalator-specific motor actions emerged after participants had stepped onto the stopped escalator despite their full awareness that it was stopped, as if the motor behavior was guided by a "phantom" of a moving escalator.
ME5 condition in session A was also analyzed as the typical condition of the habitual action of stepping onto a moving escalator.
To determine which possibility is more likely, we compared the kinematic properties of the lower limbs and upper body (Fig. 1B) when participants stepped onto a stopped escalator compared with those when they stepped onto a moving escalator and onto a wooden stairs duplicating the physical dimensions of a stopped escalator (Fig. 1A).
These findings imply that behavioral properties of stepping onto a stopped escalator do not simply reflect a mere aftereffect of motor-specific adaptation [9] or of sensory association adaptation [10], or an aftereffect of "short-term" adaptation specific to a moving escalator as in the mobile sled task in [3] [5].
In other words, the ME trials are not adaptation tasks in the sense of the typical adaptation experiment paradigm, because stepping onto a moving escalator is already a highly habituated action.
We compared the properties of motor behavior toward a stopped escalator (SE) with those toward moving escalator and toward a wooden stairs (WS) that mimicked the stopped escalator, and analyzed the subjective feeling of the odd sensation in the SE and WS conditions.
They shift into action, leaving the building; in one of the movies most striking shots, a lone warrior glides out through the stillness on a moving escalator ramp.
"But you cannot afford to stay still - business is a moving escalator.
