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Reviewer #1: PONE-D-24-43982

Practice beyond performance stabilization increases the use of online adjustments to unpredictable perturbations in an interceptive task

Couto, C., Leite, C., Campos, C., Portes, L., Matos, C., Santos, S., Ambrósio, N., Yehia, H. C., & Ugrinowitsch, H.

This study focuses on the effects of performance stabilization on motor adjustments to unpredictable target velocity during an interceptive task. Particularly, authors separated two groups based on their respective achievement of performance criteria (groups of stabilization and superstabilization). The manuscript is interesting and shows some novelty in bringing to debate the effects of level of participants’ skill, learning, or performance during an interceptive action, which certainly will attract attention of the readers of PLOS One. Overall, the manuscript is well-written, organized, based on appropriate data analysis and interpretation. However, there is a variety of weakness points and respective concerns that I have, along with some suggestions of improvement of the current version of the manuscript, as described below (following the order of appearance in the text):

i. As pointed out above, the study focuses on the stabilization process as a consequence of motor practice. But the characterization of the level of stabilization of both groups is not clearly shown. How did performance changed (or improved) from the achievement of intercepting the target three trials in a row to the achievement of intercepting the target three trials in a row six times (respectively, for stabilization and superstabilization groups)? Comparing the groups, how was variability reduced to allow performance to be considered superstable? Authors do not report performance scores for each group other than the variables number of corrections, time to peak velocity, and constant error with respect to Perturbation I (Fig. 3) and Perturbation II (Fig. 4). Interestingly, the values of constant error of both groups for PrePI1 (Fig. 3c) and PrePII1 (Fig. 4c), which are the first information available since the separation of groups, do seem very similar. It is necessary to add explicit data on the differences of the interceptive task performance between the two groups; also, providing details on the amount of practice involved in the preparation phase for both groups is necessary. Additionally, the criterion “intercepting the target three trials in a row six times” is not sufficiently clear. Provide details on what exactly “six times” mean in terms of the circumstances of the proposed method; it does not seem to be 18 times in a row (lines 194-195). Also, there is an additional definition of criteria for separating the groups (see lines 197-201), stating that an error smaller than or equal 5 cm in 200 trials for the stabilization group and an error smaller than or equal 5 cm in 320 trials for the superstabilization group. How both criteria for separating the groups were simultaneously applied? A third criterion was also used (movement time between 200-250 ms); although the use of feedback is described for different time ranges, what would happen to trials out of the expected duration (200-250 ms)? Overall, this description is very confusing. Please, clarify this issue.

ii. In a similar vein as above, there is a central question regarding the proposed design. If the main interest of authors was to understand the effects of practice on the performance of an interceptive task when target velocity changes throughout its arrival time, why did not participants practice (during preparation or acquisition phase of the study) in the same conditions (with change in target velocity) instead of practicing under target constant velocity? So the criteria for defining both groups would be specific for changes in target velocity, the proposed goal of the study. Authors need to justify the adequacy of such a design and the consequences of their choices; authors did not mention this aspect in the Introduction and/or in the Discussion section.

iii. Lines 62-66 (Introduction): “Predictable perturbations are identified before the movement onset; consequently, the action planning may contain the changes necessary to adapt to the perturbation. Conversely, unpredictable perturbations are identified only after the onset of movement; consequently, the action planning has to be reorganized after its triggering to adapt to the perturbation”. I believe that there is a misunderstanding on the distinction between motor action and visual stimuli. Stimuli may be predictable or unpredictable while stimuli perception may occur prior or after movement onset; time constraints involved in motor action and the time stimuli are available to the perceiver may vary. The suggested links between predictable – before onset and unpredictable – after onset do not seem appropriate. Please, consider to rephrase these sentences, making the concepts adequate.

iv. Lines 245-253 (Material and Methods): there are various aspects of the exposition phase that are not clear and require some discussion as follows: a first aspect refers to nomenclature. Instead of using numbers to differentiate between increase or decrease of target velocity (authors used PI and PII, respectively) and among early, intermediate, or late exposition (authors used, e.g., PI1, PI2, PI3), the terms themselves could have been used to facilitate understanding. A second aspect refers to the reason of separating data as level of the design. For example, why were three levels of responses for increase/decrease in velocity (early, intermediate, and late) used? The statistical analysis (ANOVA) proposed does not use these three levels as an independent variable of the design; why did these data were collected? Presumably, these three levels were averaged to be entered to the ANOVA. In short, it is not clear what is the importance of early, intermediate, and late exposure in this study. In the same manner, it is not clear why pre/post blocks (both with constant target velocity) were used in the experimental design; although these levels were used as independent variable, there is no explanation for using a block of trials with change in target velocity “isolated” between two (pre and post) blocks of trials with constant target velocity. The rationale of the adopted design needs to be clearly explained to readers.

v. Lines 379-380 (Discussion): “… on adjustments to unpredictable perturbations”. The amount of practice provided by the protocol was in trials with target constant velocity (predictable situation). Performance stabilization criteria for each group was reached in those predictable trials. It is not clear, and should be emphasized and discussed by authors, that stabilization criteria were achieved with practice under predictable situation.

vi. Line 384 (Discussion): “18 random trials”. These trials were not completely random because there were blocks of 3 trials to accommodate pre and post unpredictable block of trials. Provide details of the experimental design.

vii. Lines 386-388 (Discussion): “Thus confirming our hypothesis about the benefits of superstabilization in enhancing control mechanisms and performance outcomes”. This conclusion can be challenged. The adjustments were in response to unpredictable and predictable (pre and post) target velocities. In fact, the predictable ones represent 2/3 of these data submitted to ANOVA. The superstabilization also affected the predictable trials (main effect of group). In the current experimental design, benefits of superstabilization should be indicated by significant group by blocks interaction. Overall, considering three dependent variables (number of corrections, tPV, CE) and three exposures, nine significant group by blocks interactions could be found. However, for the Perturbation I, only three significant interactions were found; similarly, for the Perturbation II, only four significant interactions were found. Thus, this does not confirm the hypothesis as stated by authors. These aspects should be included in the Discussion section.

viii. Lines 478-485 (Limitations and Future Perspectives): The limitation is not clearly described. Review text.

ix. Line 505 (Conclusion): No previous reference to “forward models”. Introduction and Discussion sections could provide some background on this, if this reference is really needed.

Minor points:

lines 74-75: “… consistent internal representation of the limbs involved in the task and environmental dynamics…”. The representation should refer to limb movements’ program and/or parameters and not to the limb itself.

line 107: “the successful interception of moving interception…”. Repeated words.

lines 113-114: “…the onset of the onset…”. Repeated words.

line 123: “…relation between the level of performance stabilization level”. Repeated words.

Line 384: “The results demonstrated that…”. Demonstration seems more a result of logical reasoning, while “show” can be used as direct link to the data themselves. “The results showed that…” can be used instead.

Line 280 (as example): the term “main interaction effects” is frequently used in the Results section and is not appropriate. Traditionally, ANOVA has “main effects” (groups and blocks, in this study) and “interaction” (group by block, in this study).

Reviewer #2: General comments:

The present study examines the impact of learning or practice level on corrections to interceptive movements following an unexpected shift in target velocity. Broadly speaking, the authors highlight more rapid (%tPV) and frequent corrections (N-corr) following a state of “superstabilization” compared to the lesser “stabilization”. This study nicely highlights the mechanisms or underpinning processes that are related to corrections in interceptive tasks. The authors adopt a well-controlled study design using contemporary techniques. It is very well written. That said, there are numerous points identified that require further attention before a more substantative review can take place and an acceptance recommendation can be made. Please see below for further details.

Major comments:

Introduction:

1) What is “performance stabilization” or “superstabilization”? It should be more clearly stated or defined from the outset. This is particularly relevant when consider the seemingly menial differences between the performance levels of these learning categories (i.e., 3 right trials for stabilization and 6 right trials for superstabilization; Ln. 192-195).

2) There should be mention of the plentiful work done around dealing with unexpected online perturbations in near-aiming tasks (with set targets) [Elliott et al., 2018, Crevecoeur, Scott & Cluff, 2019].

3) While forming predictions surrounding “increased number of phase switches in the acceleration curve and a reduced time to reach peak velocity” (Ln. 132-136), it remains unclear why this may be the case due to the absence of any prior explanation or rationale.

Method:

4) As I understand it, there were a total of 129 trials with only 18 perturbation trials (x9 trials each positively [PI] and negatively [PII] accelerating) (Ln. 218-221). Is this really enough or adequately representative of a corrective response?

5) Why limit the study or analysis of “exposition” to CE and tPV%? Why not N-corr?

6) If “exposition” is of interest, then why not incorporate it as a factor in a more complex omnibus ANOVA (e.g., group x exposition x trial). As it stands, the inferential stats are somewhat fragmented and potentially limit any over-arching conclusions that could be made.

Results:

7) Interactions between group and block are identified (Ln. 289 and Ln. 303), although the pairwise comparisons reported in the text does do not shed any further light on the direction of these interactions. Along these lines, some of pairwise comparisons that are drawn appear inconsistent with some making comparisons within- (Ln. 290-291) and others between-measures (Ln. 336-337).

8) Along these lines, the symbol (*) indicating statistically significant pairwise differences in both Figures 3 and 4 look like they could be highlighting differences between-measures (i.e., SSG vs. SG), although the figure captions allude to mere “interactions differences”. If comparisons are drawn within- and between-measures, then use different symbols (e.g., [*] between, [†] within) in different locations (e.g., adjacent to data points for between, and adjacent to lines for within) accordingly.

9) In the multiple reports for CE, the direction of effects can sometimes conflate increases/decreases with error away from 0 (i.e., perfection). Rather than being too literal in describing the direction on the scale, perhaps it would be more informative to indicate the implications on error (e.g., “more negative/positive error”, “more susceptible to the negatively accelerating target”). This is not to say that direction is not important to observe because it indicates the impact of the perturbation (e.g., positively accelerating target should delay the response and add (+) to the CE score), although the nature of responses in terms of distance from 0 should be highlighted more often.

Minor comments:

Method:

1) Why an effect size of 0.3 (Ln. 145)? Based on what prior effects and related studies?

2) Does “reability” mean to be “reliability” (Ln. 146)??

3) Given the disparity between the aiming movement surface and projector display (Ln. 156-160), what was the movement gain or cursor-to-pen mapping?

4) The mention of “target velocity” and “time window” is somewhat lost on me (Ln. 186 and Ln. 222-223). What is the “time window” in reference to?

5) I take it that a 145 cm/s target velocity with a 210 cm amplitude (until reaching the intercept zone) would mean the target moves for over 1 sec (1.45 secs to be precise). Therein, with a 200-250 ms MT, then participants should have initiated their movements some time way after target motion initiation. Please clarify.

6) With a 200-250 ms MT and 27.7 cm movement amplitude, then the intended limb velocity was around 138 cm/s. Please clarify.

7) Figure 2 – Having a “blue target” and “red effector” seems odd to me, particularly when they were coloured yellow and green, respectively (like in Figure 1).

8) There does not seem to be any prior mention of “exposition” (Ln. 245)? Does it need to be “exposure”?

9) As I understand it, there were x9 trials each positively (PI) and negatively (PII) accelerating trials (Ln. 219-220). With 3 “blocks” of “exposition” (Ln. 251-253), then would that mean there were x3 trials devoted to each level of block (e.g., Pre PI2 = x3 trials)?

References:

Crevecoeur, F., Scott, S. H., Cluff, T. (2019). Robust control in human reaching movements: a model-free strategy to compensate for unpredictable disturbances. Journal of Neurophysiology, 39(41), 8135-8148.

Elliott et al. (2017). The multiple process model of goal-directed reaching revisited. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 72, 95-110.

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Reviewer #1: Yes:  SÉRGIO TOSI RODRIGUES

Reviewer #2: No

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Dear Dr. Ugrinowitsch,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

plosone@plos.org . When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

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Job Fransen

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments:

Dear authors

Reviewer two has raised additional concerns which I would need to see addressed properly before recommending acceptance of your manuscript. Please address those at your earliest convenience.

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions??>

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? -->?>

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available??>

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English??>

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

Reviewer #1: Authors have fully answered the majority of points raised and provided an improved version of the manuscript. I appreciated the detailed explanations authors have made. Although I do not completely agree with part of the reasoning/answers presented by authors, it is clear that this new version of the manuscript is easier to read and flows better. I understand that the most relevant aspects which needed change were sufficiently improved to publication standards.

Reviewer #2: General comments:

The authors have made robust attempts to handle any comments. However, there mostly existing issues that I believe remain outstanding. Perhaps most obvious are the comments related to analysis choices and the outline of key interactions within the text. I have further detailed below:

Major comments:

Introduction:

1) While stabilization has been operationally defined within the manuscript, I find the explanation offered in the response letter to be more informative. Perhaps include some of this content, including details of empirical findings (e.g., Campos et al., 2022), in order to better envisage the state of (super-)stabilization.

Method:

2) I remain unconvinced by the failure to incorporate “exposure” into the analysis. It has been explained within the response letter that changes/learning were not of primarily concern when it came to the perturbation trials, although it begs the question: why consider “exposure” in the first place including the separation of perturbation trial blocks (i.e., x3 trials per block)?

Results:

3) While the direction of effects has been made much clearer, the failure to decompose interactions within the text still remains. Instead, I’m having to solely observe the between-group differences purported in Figures 3 and 4 (via symbols) because the text mostly describes common differences between blocks within SG and SSG groups (synonymous with a block main effect) (Ln. 312-315, 327-330). When it comes to the interaction, I would advise focusing the report on the differences highlighted within the fore mentioned figures (e.g., CE in fast speed perturbation: SSG < SG for P, SSG > SG for Post).

Minor comments:

Introduction:

4) I may have misquoted the year of citation for Elliott et al. Here is the reference:

Elliott et al. (2017). The multiple process model of goal-directed reaching revisited. Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews, 72, 95-110.

Method:

5) With regard the physical-to-virtual movement gain, there is mention of movement on the table and display being the same, but that can’t be possible. The movement on the table was only ~27 cm, while it was projected onto a large projector nearing a 2-m vertical amplitude (i.e., movement on the display will have gone visually further and faster than the limb in reality).

6) The following description does not seem to compute: “The velocity at which the target moved was 145 cm/s. A 4 × 6 cm target moving at 145 cm/s and a 2 × 4 cm effector resulted in a 68,96 ms time window” (Ln. 192-193). Is this 6,896 ms (6.896 secs)? If the target is travelling 213 cm at 145 cm/s, then it ought to be nearer ~1.5 secs of travel time.

7) The following description could be more clearly worded: “After 10 min of reaching the performance criterion started the Exposure phase” (Ln. 233-234).

8) While the rationale for only 9 trials per category of perturbation is robust within the response letter, we’re none-the-wiser when it comes to reading solely the manuscript. Some of the logic explained (including Fonseca et al. citation) should be highlight here (Ln. 236).

9) It states “The time window of Pfast was 50 ms, and the time window of Pslow was 111 ms” (Ln. 239), although if the onset of the target velocity perturbation was contingent upon the onset of the interceptive movement (with varying time to initiate and velocity of movement), then should the “time window” not between trials.

10) Upon second reading of the calculus of error (Ln. 206-207, 254-255), I’m unsure exactly about how it was really done. The description in Ln. 206-207 would make me think it was the distance between the target (yellow) and effector (green) at the moment of the former reaching the “strike zone”. However, viewing Figure 3 would make me think it was all about the distance between the target and “strike zone” at the moment that the effector reached the “strike zone”. Please explain and make clear the implication of direction (i.e., negatively signed scores indicate too slow an interceptive movement, while positively signed scores indicate a pre-exempted response).

11) The explanation offered for the “Pre” and “Post” trials is not entirely clear (Ln. 264-268). For example, the following statement on “The Pre trials are the reference to identify what happens with the performance and with the motor control when perturbations are inserted” reads like it is the perturbation trials themselves (thus bearing no distinction from “P trials”).

12) The detail behind the perturbation blocks also gets somewhat muddled (Ln. 271-273). There has to be an easier way to explain or simplify this.

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Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Dear Dr. Ugrinowitsch,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS ONE. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS ONE’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by Sep 05 2025 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org . When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

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If applicable, we recommend that you deposit your laboratory protocols in protocols.io to enhance the reproducibility of your results. Protocols.io assigns your protocol its own identifier (DOI) so that it can be cited independently in the future. For instructions see: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/s/submission-guidelines#loc-laboratory-protocols . Additionally, PLOS ONE offers an option for publishing peer-reviewed Lab Protocol articles, which describe protocols hosted on protocols.io. Read more information on sharing protocols at https://plos.org/protocols?utm_medium=editorial-email&utm_source=authorletters&utm_campaign=protocols .

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Job Fransen

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

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1. If the reviewer comments include a recommendation to cite specific previously published works, please review and evaluate these publications to determine whether they are relevant and should be cited. There is no requirement to cite these works unless the editor has indicated otherwise. 

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Additional Editor Comments :

Dear authors,

Reviewer two has made some really valuable suggestions, which which I concur. There is an overall lack of claroty throughout your manuscript concerning its methodology and statistical analyses. At this time, I am inclined to suggest a rejection if these issues cannot be rectified upon review. It seems pretty clear that your work has merit (one of the reviewers has accepted after your most recent amendments), but both myself and reviewer two have some lingering concerns.

Thank you for addressing these promptly.

Job

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? -->?>

Reviewer #2: No

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available??>

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

Reviewer #2: General comments: The authors have entirely addressed previous comments surrounding the study rationale and supporting evidence within the Introduction. However, my uncertainly grows around the description of the analysis and eventual statistical outcomes. See below for details.

Major Comments:

1) The explanation of the trials does not entirely make sense, and what’s more, it may not even help matters. Either remove or elaborate (Ln. 310-315).

2) The difficulty in understanding may be the distinction between what is effectively x3 levels of exposure (pre, intermediate, post-) and x3 levels of block (trials 1-3, 4-6, 7-9). That is, there appears a confluence in the explanation for each of these factors (Ln. 316-321). Perhaps more definitively distinguish each of these (e.g., …exposure pertained to the immediately before (Pre), during (P) and after (Post) a perturbation, which was further brokered into block 1 (trials 1-3), block 2 (trials 4-6) and block 3 (trials 7-9).

3) The nomenclature used to define exposure and block is not exactly intuitive or easy to follow (i.e., “Block 1 with Pre, P1fast and Post, b) Block 2 with Pre, P2fast and Post…”) (Ln. 321-323). How about something like the following instead?: Pre1-3fast/slow, P1-3fast/slow, Post1-3fast/slow

4) Fore mentioned confusion is further compounded by the description of the two-way ANOVA where it appears block (1-3) was featured as a factor, but in reality it was exposure (Pre, P, Post) (Ln. 327-329).

5) (Unless I’m missing something completely here!) The same problem applies for the description of the inferential statistics (i.e., there is a constant reference to ‘blocks’ when I think it should be ‘exposure’, while blocks [1-3] were assessed separately in different sub-sections of the Results) (Pg. 14-18).

6) While pairwise difference have been more explicitly incorporated, they fail to decompose the group x block (i.e., exposure) interaction (e.g., “Post hoc analysis revealed that the same pattern was observed for the GS (p < 0.05)”). That is, the inferential stats report a similar pattern of influence of exposure within SSG and SG; thus, there would seem no difference between groups as a function of exposure. Meanwhile, there are asterisks within Figure 3 and 4 alluding to so-called “Interaction differences”. Due to this uncertainly we cannot really comprehend what has really been found here, and thus we cannot conclude anything concrete.

Minor comments:

7) “Consecutives” should be “consecutive” (i.e., no “s”) (Ln. 92).

8) “Internal Models” is capitalised either in error or for some unknown reason.

9) Excessively long sentence with some missing connecting words and/or punctuation (Ln. 115-120).

10) “GS” typos instead of “SG” (e.g., Ln. 419).

11) Tendency to mix up the past and present terms for ‘withdraw’ (e.g., “withdrawal” instead of “withdrawn”).

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what does this mean? ). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

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Reviewer #2: Yes:  James Roberts

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Dear Dr. Ugrinowitsch,

Please submit your revised manuscript by Nov 14 2025 11:59PM. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at plosone@plos.org . When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pone/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

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PLOS ONE

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? -->?>

Reviewer #2: Yes

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4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available??>

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

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Reviewer #2: General comments:

The authors had adequately addressed any previous comments; especially, the outline of study factors and subsequent pairwise comparisons. I have but a few minor comments to tease apart or elaborate on the previously made changes. Assuming these minor changes are implemented, then I would recommend acceptance for publication.

Minor comments:

1) The modified description of the analysis could be made clearer and more explicit (Ln. 335-337). Perhaps the following: “The CE and tPV% measures from each of the exposure phase moments (Early, Intermediate and Later) and perturbations (fast, slow) were analysed using a two-way mixed-design ANOVA consisting of group (SG and SSG) and block (Pre, P, Post) factors.”

2) Post hoc analysis was unable to decouple the interaction between group and block for the following: Intermediate moment: Pre P x P4-6fast x Post P (Ln. 366-372), Later moment: Pre P x P7-9fast x Post P (Ln. 382-388). This should be made clearer within the text report (along similar lines to that reported by the authors in the previous ‘response to comments’ letter).

3) Potential misreport in the post hoc that decouples the interaction (Ln. 430): “…the SSG showed lower (closest to zero) CE than SG in P4-6slow and similar CE in Pre and P4-6slow (p < 0.05).”

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what does this mean? ). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

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Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy

Reviewer #2: Yes:  James W. Roberts

**********

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<p>Practice beyond performance stabilization increases the use of online adjustments to unpredictable perturbations in an interceptive task

PONE-D-24-43982R4

Dear Dr. Ugrinowitsch,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Dimitris Voudouris

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

**********

2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously? -->?>

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available??>

The PLOS Data policy

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English??>

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

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what does this mean? ). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy

Reviewer #2: Yes:  James W. Roberts

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