Effect of Shoe Characteristic during Walking Acceleration and Deceleration

Abstract

Walking in daily life is not always in ideal and constant speed, normal walking will often interrupted by avoidance of obstacles, changing in walking speed and turning to other walking direction. Shoes with different characteristic may also give different impact on the joint loading at lower extremities. Therefore, the aim of this study is to investigate the impact of three different types of footwear: sneakers, flip-flop and sport shoes, on lower extremities by evaluating the kinetic and kinematic parameters from both gender groups during acceleration and deceleration walking on treadmill. In this study, 15 male and 15 female healthy participants are recruited to perform gait analysis. Inverse dynamic method is applied into the self-derived mathematical model to analyse knee joint moment. Motion analysis parameters (VGRF, Knee Joint Moment, Impulse, Step Length, Stride Length & Cadence) been analyzed in this study. Both genders showed significant higher value of deceleration VGRF and knee joint moment compare to acceleration, while acceleration impulse is larger than deceleration. Step length and stride length of acceleration significantly higher than deceleration and resulting lower cadence. Footwear does not give significant impact to VGRF and knee joint moment. Sport shoes do not show significant changes on all investigated parameters. Sneaker and flip-flop were significantly reduced the walking cadence. The outcome of this finding provides a fundamental to understand the impact of footwear during acceleration and deceleration.