A longitudinal study of motor ability and kinaesthetic acuity in young children at risk of developmental coordination disorder

Several studies have linked poor kinaesthetic ability with poor motor coordination in school-aged children. However, few studies have investigated kinaesthesis in younger children. The aim of this study was to determine if preschool aged children who have been identified as at risk of developing developmental coordination disorder (DCD) have poorer kinaesthetic ability than matched controls. Kinaesthetic ability and performance IQ were examined in a group of children aged between 4 and 5 years. Following individual assessment of 291 children, 31 were identified as at risk of DCD at this age. One year later, 30 of these children were retested, and 23 were still found to be at risk. These children were matched on verbal IQ, age and sex with control children and their performance compared on the kinaesthetic acuity test (KAT) [D.J. Livesey and N.A. Parkes, Aust. J. Psychol., 47 (1995) 160] and three subtests of the WPPSI-R performance IQ (D. Wechsler, Manual for the Wechsler preschool and primary scale of intelligence--revised, Psychological Corporation, New York, 1989). Both the KAT and the performance subtest scores were found to be significantly poorer in the children at risk of DCD. Follow-up testing one year later showed that both groups improved their kinaesthetic acuity score although the control children remained significantly better than the children with poor motor coordination.     

Perceptual-motor development and prevention of clumsiness

Summary This longitudinal study, following children's development over three years, examines the developmental trends in the processes underlying perceptual-motor behaviour. Entry into the study was at first year of primary school, at age 6. The study has three aims: (1) to obtain developmental trends in kinaesthesis and motor-programming processes; (2) to examine the relationship between slow kinaesthetic and motor development; (3) to establish the effect of accelerated kinaesthetic development and prevention of perceptual-motor dysfunction (clumsiness). The results to date show that over 60% of children entering primary school have not developed the kinaesthetic ability necessary for the acquisition and learning of educationally demanded motor skills. Kinaesthetic development is accelerated spontaneously in some children as a response to educational demands; in others a single exposure to kinaesthetic input triggers significant improvement. In the remaining 17% kinaesthetic training can alleviate the kinaesthetic dysfunction. At age 5–6 years only 25 children (8.1%) performed the Perceptual-Motor Abilities Test at levels indicative of perceptual-motor dysfunction. Of these, 13 children (4.2%) were identified as having motor difficulties. These low incidence rates indicate that a low level of kinaesthetic ability has no effect on general motor function at the beginning of schooling, and that only when competence in complex motor skills is expected, from the third year of schooling, does perceptual-motor dysfunction (PMD) become manifest.The work reported in this article was supported by Australian Research Council Grant number A78931998     

The performance of a simple motor task with kinaesthetic sense loss

Two related studies were carried out, to test the suitability of the nerve compression block as a technique in the investigation of kinaesthesis in motor skills.

In both studies a key tapping task was used. Each experimental group was composed of six volunteer subjects. It was found that kinaesthetic sensation was eliminated after pressure had been applied for 20-25 min., but muscle power was not seriously affected at this stage of the block. The results also showed a pronounced performance decrement in the absence of kinaesthetic feedback, and that this decrement was not due to emotional or other disturbances caused by the experimental procedure. The loss of tactile sensation was also observed.     

A psychophysical measure of visual and kinaesthetic spatial discriminative abilities of adults and children

Quantitative estimates of the spatial discriminative capacities of the visual and kinaesthetic systems in adults and children were obtained. Intersensory integration was investigated by including spatial discriminations based on congruent visual plus kinaesthetic reafference. The psychophysical method of adjustment was used with simultaneous comparisons of a fixed and a variable stimulus. The subject's task was to estimate when the variable stimulus (ellipse) was identical to the standard one (circle), under one of three modality conditions: vision, kinaesthesis, and vision plus kinaesthesis. After a pilot study with adults, children (aged 8, 10, and 12 years) and adults were both tested. Subjects from each age group were randomly allocated to each of the three experimental conditions. Results show that the visual and kinaesthetic estimates of the 8- and 10-year-old subjects did not differ significantly, but the visual responses of the adults and 12 year olds were significantly more accurate than corresponding kinaesthetic estimates. Bisensory estimates were significantly more accurate than visual responses only for the 8- and 10-year-old age groups. Intramodal comparisons showed the kinaesthetic estimates of the 8, 10, and 12 year olds to be significantly more accurate than the corresponding adult performance. Adult visual estimates were significantly more accurate than those made by 8 year olds, but were not significantly different from the visual responses of 10 and 12 year olds. Estimates based on bisensory reafference did not differ from each other across the four age groups. It is concluded that modality adeptness and dominance are task dependent and empirically determined rather than being innate properties of sensory systems. The data indicate that intersensory differentiation rather than integration occurs with maturity.     

Visual, kinaesthetic and cross-modal development: relationships to motor skill development

The ability of children between the ages of 5 and 10 years to match the length of lines within and between the modalities of vision and kinaesthesis was studied. No evidence was found for specific increases in cross-modal skill which could not be explained in terms of within-modal development. Performance in the perceptual task was related to measures of developing motor skill in the children. Substantial relationships were found between performance on the within-modal tasks and motor skill, but no significant relationships were found between cross-modal measures and motor skill development. It is concluded that the development of cross-modal integration is not a major determinant of motor skill development.     

Sensory and motor impairment in the nerve compression block

Recently nerve compression block as a method of investigating movement control without kinaesthetic feedback has been questioned on the grounds that motor impairment (as measured by nerve conduction parameters) is a confounding factor. In order to clarify the relationship between sensory and motor function, behavioural data was obtained on both at systematic time intervals throughout the duration of the block. The findings indicated that significant decrements in tapping measures occurred somewhat earlier in the time course of the block than decreases in kinaesthetic discrimination. Also, contrary to assumption, the majority of subjects ceased to perform prior to total kinaesthetic loss. The data suggest that motor impairment is a “crucial” issue (Laszlo, 1966) in the use of this technique, and provide further behavioural support for the neurological findings of Kelso, Stelmach and Wanamaker (1974).     

Reduced corticomotor excitability with cyclic passive movement: a study using transcranial magnetic stimulation

Human voluntary movement involves the integration of kinaesthetic information with efferent motor activity during the planning and execution stages of movement. While much is known of the inhibitory and excitatory effects resulting from activation of specific kinaesthetic sensory receptors, in the present study we employed cyclic passive movement of the index finger in order to activate a range of kinaesthetic receptors in a manner that was intended to correspond to how these receptors might be active during a comparable voluntary movement. We intended to identify how this passive movement protocol might affect the excitability of the corticomotor pathway. During 1 Hz cyclic passive movement of the index finger there was an approximately 60% reduction in the amplitude of the motor evoked response from the first dorsal interosseous muscle. The results of the present study demonstrate that passive movement can have a profound effect on the excitability of the corticomotor pathway.     

Training of fast tapping with reduction of kinaesthetic, tactile, visual and auditory sensations

Five subjects were trained to tap on a light Morse-key during nerve compression block. The training sessions lasted for 40 sec., with a 5 sec. rest after the first 20 sec. work period. The group learning curve reached 89.5 per cent. level of normal performance by the eighth training session. In the ninth, the testing session, subjects tapped with visual and auditory sense reduction superimposed on the kinaesthetic and tactile impariment of the training condition. Performance in the testing session reached 40.9 per cent. of normal.

The sixth subject was trained in the same task as the other five subjects, but the training condition included elimination of cues from all four sensory channels. He reached 79.09 per cent. of his normal tapping performance in the seventh session.

These results show that the motor skill of tapping can be relearned in the absence of kinaesthetic cues. Furthermore when the subject has no conscious knowledge of any peripheral sensory cues connected with the ongoing motor activity, learning can nevertheless take place. These findings lead to the hypothesis, that skilled motor activity can be monitored by central processes alone.

During the training sessions subjects showed a tendency of tapping in groups of gradually increasing length. It is hypothesized that increased number of taps forming a group gives an indication to the possible mode of action of these central processes.     

Kinaesthetic judgements of the direction of line by young children

The ability of young children to make kinaesthetic judgements of direction of line has been studied under recognition and detection conditions. Some children were not more accurate than chance when they were required to indicate the same one of a pair of mirror image obliques lines over a series of trials; these children could, however, detect whether two obliques were oriented in the same direction or in different directions. These latter data suggest that the poor recognition of mirror image obliques arises from deficiencies in spatial categorizing and not in input coding. This conclusion is supported by the finding that children who performed poorly on the kinaesthetic recognition of obliques performed poorly on the visual recognition of these figures.     

Early infant crawling experience is reflected in later motor skill development

The influences of early crawling experience on motor skill development were examined in children identified by parents as crawlers or noncrawlers during early infancy. Relative to the performance of crawlers, noncrawlers showed lower average and subtest-specific performance on selected measures of the Miller Assessment for Preschoolers. These results, interpreted through Ayres' sensory integration theory and applied to current occupational therapy practice, support Farber's hypothesized importance of early crawling experience in the development of sensory and motor systems of the body and general motor skill development.     

Training compliance control yields improved drawing in 5–11 year old children with motor difficulties

There are a large number of children with motor difficulties including those that have difficulty producing movements qualitatively well enough to improve in perceptuo-motor learning without intervention. We have developed a training method that supports active movement generation to allow improvement in a 3D tracing task requiring good compliance control. Previously, we tested a limited age range of children and found that training improved performance on the 3D tracing task and that the training transferred to a 2D drawing test. In the present study, school children (5–11 years old) with motor difficulties were trained in the 3D tracing task and transfer to a 2D drawing task was tested. We used a cross-over design where half of the children received training on the 3D tracing task during the first training period and the other half of the children received training during the second training period. Given previous results, we predicted that younger children would initially show reduced performance relative to the older children, and that performance at all ages would improve with training. We also predicted that training would transfer to the 2D drawing task. However, the pre-training performance of both younger and older children was equally poor. Nevertheless, post-training performance on the 3D task was dramatically improved for both age groups and the training transferred to the 2D drawing task. Overall, this work contributes to a growing body of literature that demonstrates relatively preserved motor learning in children with motor difficulties and further demonstrates the importance of games in therapeutic interventions.     

Cross-lateralisation in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder and motor skill performance

Cross-lateralisation and increased motor difficulties have been reported in children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Nevertheless, the question of how crossed (i.e. mixed preference) or uncrossed (i.e. same side preference) lateralisation impacts motor performance in children with ADHD has yet to be examined. In this study, previously validated observational measures of hand and foot preference were used to identify right-handed children with ADHD who display cross- (n = 29) and uncross-lateralisation (n = 31). An uncross-lateralised typically developing (TD) group (n = 32) was also identified, and included as a control. Motor performance was assessed with seven valid and reliable fine and gross motor tasks performed with both preferred and non-preferred limbs. Group, task and sex-related effects were examined. Findings revealed that male (but not female) cross-lateralised children with ADHD performed significantly worse, respectively, in two of the fine motor tasks (spiral tracing [p < .01], and dot filling [p < .05]). Results suggest that cross-lateralised hand and foot preference may affect complex motor skills in male children with ADHD. Furthermore, characteristics of ADHD may manifest differently in male and female children. Findings highlight the importance of considering both hand and foot preference when targeting motor interventions for children with ADHD.     

The influence of motor function on processing speed in preterm and term-born children

This study investigates the relationship between motor function and processing speed in preterm children. Processing speed was compared in 145 adolescents, born 25–41 weeks gestational age, utilizing tasks including differing motor demands. The influence of motor cortex excitability and functional motor skills on task performance was assessed. For tasks with motoric demands, differences in performance between preterm and term-born children were mediated by the relationship between gestational age, corticomotor excitability, and motor function. There were no differences in non-motor processing speed task performance between preterm and term-born children. Measures of processing speed may be confounded by a timed motor component.     

Working memory and fine motor skills predict early numeracy performance of children with cerebral palsy

Early numeracy is an important precursor for arithmetic performance, academic proficiency, and work success. Besides their apparent motor difficulties, children with cerebral palsy (CP) often show additional cognitive disturbances. In this study, we examine whether working memory, non-verbal intelligence, linguistic skills, counting and fine motor skills are positively related to the early numeracy performance of 6-year-old children with CP. A total of 56 children (M = 6.0, SD = 0.61, 37 boys) from Dutch special education schools participated in this cross-sectional study. Of the total group, 81% of the children have the spastic type of CP (33% unilateral and 66% bilateral), 9% have been diagnosed as having diskinetic CP, 8% have been diagnosed as having spastic and diskinetic CP and 2% have been diagnosed as having a combination of diskinetic and atactic CP. The children completed standardized tests assessing early numeracy performance, working memory, non-verbal intelligence, sentence understanding and fine motor skills. In addition, an experimental task was administered to examine their basic counting performance. Structural equation modeling showed that working memory and fine motor skills were significantly related to the early numeracy performance of the children (β = .79 and p < .001, β = .41 and p < .001, respectively). Furthermore, counting was a mediating variable between working memory and early numeracy (β = .57, p < .001). Together, these findings highlight the importance of working memory for early numeracy performance in children with CP and they warrant further research into the efficacy of intervention programs aimed at working memory training.     

The degree of stability in motor performance in preschool children and its association with child-related variables

Understanding the stability of individual differences in motor performance during the early years of life, despite normative age-related growth in motor performance, has important implications for identification of motor coordination difficulties and subsequently, early remediation. Therefore, the aims of the present study were to examine the degree of rank-order and individual-level stability in motor performance in young children with different levels of motor skill proficiency. Subsequently, we explored the influence of child variables (i.e., age, gender, and behavioural self-regulation) on different aspects of stability. In this longitudinal study, a community sample of 68 participants (49% girls) with a mean age of 3 years and 11 months (SD = 7 months) were assesses in three six-monthly waves. The total standard score of the Movement Assessment Battery for Children-2 (MABC-2) was used as the measure of motor performance. Rank-order stability was examined with zero-order Pearson correlations. Individual-level stability was examined by means of stability in classifications (at risk for motor coordination difficulties versus typically developing). In addition to examining stability in group classification, the Reliable Change Index (RCI) was calculated to examine if the difference in a child's scores over time exceeded (increased or decreased relative to) the expected change. The results showed moderate to high rank-order stability between time points. No significant differences in degree of rank-order stability were found between boys and girls and between 3-year old and 4-year old children. In terms of stability of classification, it was shown that for ~50% of the children with motor coordination difficulties and ~ 90% of typically developing the classification based on the cut-off score on the MABC-2 was stable. Based on the RCI, over 90% showed individual-level stability. The level of behavioural self-regulation at T1 (as measured with the Head-Toes-Knees-Shoulders task) was not significantly related to individual-level stability in motor performance. In conclusion, our findings highlight the importance of a careful choice of stability measures and a reflection on the implications of their results. More research is needed to understand which child and environmental variables impact on stability.     

The Motor Profile of Primary School-Age Children with a 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome (22q11.2DS) and an Age- and IQ-Matched Control Group

In the early publications on the 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome (22q11.2DS) motor abnormalities have been frequently reported. However, systematic studies on the motor performance of children with the 22q11.2DS, and especially of school-age children, are scarce. In this study the motor performance of primary school-age children with a 22q11.2DS (n = 28) was compared with an age- and IQ-matched control group (n = 28) using the Movement Assessment Battery for Children (MABC), the Körperkoordinationstest für Kinder (KTK) and the Beery-Buctenica test of Visual-Motor Integration (Beery). Children with a 22q11.2DS scored significantly lower than the age- and IQ-matched control group on the subsection Manual Dexterity (MABC) and the Visual Perception and Motor Coordination subtests of the Beery. When investigating the correlations between Intelligence quotient (IQ) and motor performance, a specific profile was found in the 22q11.2DS group when compared with the age- and IQ-matched control group. Because an IQ-matched control group was adopted, the deficits in visual-perceptual and visuomotor integration skills cannot fully be attributed to a general developmental delay and thus may be specific for the 22q11.2DS. Future studies that investigate the specificity of the visual-perceptual problems — both on the behavioral and brain level (functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging [fMRI] and Diffusion Tensor Imaging [DTI]) — are necessary to answer this question. Nonetheless, the importance of incorporating motor functioning into the study of the neuropsychological profile of children with a 22q11.2DS has to be stressed.     

儿童的人际运动同步

人际运动同步是一种“社会胶粘剂”,能促进儿童产生更多的亲社会行为。儿童的人际运动同步能力随着年龄的增长不断提升,其同步表现受到运动方式、节奏刺激类型、同步对象等因素影响。在人际运动同步过程中,时间感知、运动计划和运动执行三大认知因素参与其中,既制约着个体同步能力的发展,也影响个体同步的表现。孤独症作为一种神经发育性障碍,孤独症儿童表现出异常的人际运动同步。未来的研究不仅要探讨孤独症儿童人际运动同步的异常机制,还要更多关注人际运动同步训练在孤独症群体中的实际应用和干预效果。     

Perceiving limb position in normal and abnormal control: An equilibrium point perspective

Two potential sources of information allow the nervous system to determine limb position in egocentric space: (i) limb kinaesthesis and (ii) extraretinal cues to direction and distance. We argue that both of these information sources arise from essentially similar physiological origins – copies of the central commands issued by the nervous system together with afferent discharge fed back from the relevant peripheral effectors. A number of studies have demonstrated that judgements of limb position are more accurate when limb kinaesthesis is combined with extraretinal cues. We review some recent studies which suggest that the weighting attached to these two sources of information varies as a function of the amount of retinal detail present within the environment. We conclude by considering how the perception of limb position may be affected in cases of abnormal movement control.PsycINFO classification: 2221; 3250; 3299     

Quantitative and qualitative evaluation of neuromotor behaviour in children with a specific speech and language disorder

Several studies have described problems in a wide area of motor functions in language impaired children. The purpose of this study was to identify the nature of the motor deficits in two subgroups of language impaired children. A standard neurological examination was performed on 18 children with an expressive language disorder and 21 children with a receptive language disorder. The motor performance of the language disordered children was compared with the motor performance of 23 normal children. The standard neurological examination allowed for a qualitative and quantitative assessment of five specific neurological subsystems. Handedness was determined for all children. The language impaired children had more motor problems than the control children on most neurological subsystems. There were few statistically significant differences between the two groups of language impaired children. An excess in left‐handedness was established in the group of children with a receptive language disorder. There was a co‐occurrence of verbal and non‐verbal deficits in language impaired children. As these motor problems put an additional burden on the development of language impaired children, they should be diagnosed as early as possible. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Sleep-dependent consolidation of procedural motor memories in children and adults: the pre-sleep level of performance matters

In striking contrast to adults, in children sleep following training a motor task did not induce the expected (offline) gain in motor skill performance in previous studies. Children normally perform at distinctly lower levels than adults. Moreover, evidence in adults suggests that sleep dependent offline gains in skill essentially depend on the pre-sleep level of performance. Against this background, we asked whether improving children's performance on a motor sequence learning task by extended training to levels approaching those of adults would enable sleep-associated gains in motor skill in this age group also. Children (4-6 years) and adults (18-35 years) performed on the motor sequence learning task (button-box task) before and after ~2-hour retention intervals including either sleep (midday nap) or wakefulness. Whereas one group of children and adults, respectively, received the standard amount of 10 blocks of training before retention intervals of sleep or wakefulness, a further group of children received an extended training on 30 blocks (distributed across 3 days). A further group of adults received a restricted training on only two blocks before the retention intervals. Children after standard training reached lowest performance levels, whereas in adults performance after standard training was highest. Children with extended training and adults after reduced training reached intermediate performance levels. Only at these intermediate performance levels did sleep induce significant gains in motor sequence skill, whereas performance did not benefit from sleep in the low-performing children or in the high-performing adults. Spindle counts in the post-training nap were correlated with performance gains at retrieval only in the adults benefitting from sleep. We conclude that, across age groups, sleep induces the most robust gain in motor skill at an intermediate pre-sleep performance level. In low-performing children sleep-dependent improvements in skill may be revealed only after enhancing the pre-sleep performance level by extended training.