Measure. Analyze. Learn.
This is the Hand Dynamometer.
It measures grip strength. It's used in our physiology manual.
And so, the way it operates is, it's a force sensor.
This part of the sensor is used with my hand,
so, I could squeeze this and measure the force that way.
This upper portion is a finger strength area,
so, I can squeeze this, maybe in turn, with different fingers,
and measure the individual strength of each finger.
And so, doctors use devices like this for somebody who,
maybe, has had hand surgery, they would like to be able
to quantify grip strength, and do that.
So, let's use it to collect a little data.
So, I'm going to plug it into my LabQuest.
And, when we do this, we end up with the meter screen there.
And, it's showing me that I have force, on the screen there.
And, you will notice right now, that it's reading
some value there that’s not zero.
And part of that's, because the orientation of this,
how I've been using it, I've squeezed it before.
So, one of the things that's often done with this particular sensor
is that you might zero the sensor before you begin collection.
And so, you can hold it in the orientation
you are going to be using it; zero the sensor;
and then start your data collection from that point.
So, I'm going to do that.
So, I'll come in here; tap on the meter there;
and I will 'Zero' it . So now, it's giving me a reading close to zero.
I'm going to use the default settings for the device.
It's a 60 second collection there.
So, if we look, we'll see we've got
the 'Time Based' - '10 samples/s' - for 60 seconds of collection.
And, I'm going to do one of the labs where I will
squeeze this as hard as I can for the 60 seconds.
And, we look at what happens to my strength
as my muscles fatigue.
So, what I want to do is squeeze it first as hard as I can.
I'm going to hit [collect].
And, I'm going to continue to squeeze,
as hard as I can for the 60 seconds.
You'll notice that I'm beginning to kind of weaken a little bit.
It's hard, but what is happening is that my muscles are fatiguing.
And, that's really the point of this lab.
What I would like to be able to do is to go and
analyze the data at the beginning of the run,
maybe compare it to the end of the run,
and see what happens to my muscle strength, when we do that.
So, we'll let it go along here, and continue collection.
Collection is complete, and we see the data there.
And, we notice that it starts a little higher up here,
and, of course, it goes down here.
Now, it's a little bumpy, because as your sitting there squeezing,
you know, sometimes you've experienced that,
where you're squeezing as hard as you can,
you may start to shake a little bit.
But, let's take a look at, maybe, the part of the data that's
in this first part of the section here.
So, I'm just going to highlight a little region in the data
and, that first section, and I would like to know,
"What's the average force during that section?"
So, I'm going to go up to 'Analyze';
and go to 'Statistics'; and go to 'Force'.
And, what happens here, is if I look at my mean force
for that part of the collection, I get 193 Newtons,
for that initial part of the collection there.
And, what I'll do next, is go and turn that off again.
And, I want to go back and analyze,
maybe, this last part of the graph.
And so, I'll highlight a region there, and close to the end
And, I can go back; do the stats again;
and this time I end up with a mean force of 125.8 Newtons.
At that point, my grip strength is not as strong as it was before.
I did the first run by squeezing this with my hand.
I would like to do another run.
And this time, I'm actually going to
look at the grip strength of individual fingers.
So, I just need to store that first run and be able to collect again.
To store this run, I might want to refer back to it later;
I can just go up and tap in the [filing cabinet] there,
and that will store the first run.
Now, I'm ready to collect, so I press the [collect] button again.
And, I'll let it run there for a few seconds without squeezing.
And then, what I will do is squeeze in turn,
So, I'll start with my index finger.
Squeeze there for a few seconds.
And let it go.
Squeeze again with my middle finger.
{squeeze there} Let go.
Go to my ring finger.
{keep squeezing a little bit there}
And then lastly, my pinky.
{go for a few more seconds}
And let go.
And, I can either just let it run out, or I could stop collection.
And now, we have the data on the screen.
So now, I have my individual runs there,
and I might be interested in looking at the data
for different parts, or maybe I want the average force
applied by each finger during that time period.
So what I can do is I could come in here,
and highlight this region of the graph.
And, if I go up now and do 'Analyze', I could go and do the stats,
and get the mean force for that finger,
would be 72.8 Newtons for my pointer finger there.
If I wanted to do the other ones, I would go here
and turn off the stats there.
And then, I can come over here,
and I can tap and drag over that finger.
And, go and do the stats again.
And, for this one I end up with 39.9 for my mean.
And I can continue to do this for the rest of the fingers.
The Hand Dynamometer. It's for measuring grip strength.
I've found that it is a sensor
that students engage with very readily.
They enjoy using it,
because they see that instant feedback with the data
It naturally lends itself to a little classroom competition there.
So you could plug in more than one of these at a time,
and compare grip strengths.
Obviously, do the comparison of right and left hand,
dominant, and non-dominant,
maybe an athlete versus a non athlete.
And so, for engaging students it is a wonderful sensor.