Abstract
We aim to test how well modern nonhabitual barefoot people can adapt to barefoot and Minimalist Bare Foot Technology (MBFT) shoes, in regard to gait symmetry. 28 healthy university students (22 females/6 males) were recruited to walk on a 10-meter walkway randomly on barefoot, in MBFT shoes, and in neutral running shoes at their comfortable walking speed. Kinetic and kinematic data were collected using an 8-camera motion capture system. Data of joint angles, joint forces, and joint moments were extracted to compute a consecutive symmetry index. Compared to walking in neutral running shoes, walking barefoot led to worse symmetry of the following: ankle joint force in sagittal plane, knee joint moment in transverse plane, and ankle joint moment in frontal plane, while improving the symmetry of joint angle in sagittal plane at ankle joints and global (hip-knee-ankle) level. Walking in MBFT shoes had intermediate gait symmetry performance as compared to walking barefoot/walking in neutral running shoes. We conclude that modern nonhabitual barefoot adults will lose some gait symmetry in joint force/moment if they switch to barefoot walking without fitting in; MBFT shoe might be an ideal compromise for healthy youth as regards gait symmetry in walking.
Highlights
There has been a renewed enthusiasm for barefoot running
It is increasingly recognized that asymmetric gait would undermine the alignment and configuration of lower limb joints and contribute to the pathologies and a risk of injury in the lower extremities [7,8,9,10]. This leads us to a question: how well will nonhabitual barefoot modern youth adapt to barefoot or Minimalist Bare Foot Technology (MBFT) shoe walking in the perspective of gait symmetry after having habituated to different style of shoes? Using a recently developed consecutive symmetry index (SI) that is able to quantify lower extremity symmetry either categorically for the motion in each of the three motion planes and at each of the three lower limb joints or globally for the motion in all the three motion planes or at all the three lower limb joints [11], we aim to evaluate gait asymmetry performance in a group of healthy university students for 3 walking conditions: barefoot, in MBFT shoes, and in neutral shoes
As expected, enrolled subjects walked faster on average with shoes than walked barefoot (walking speed (m/s): in MBFT shoe: 1.29 ± 0.11; in neutral shoe: 1.32 ± 0.13; barefoot: 1.23 ± 0.11; the difference between walking in neutral shoe and walking barefoot was significant on statistic, p < 0.05)
Summary
There has been a renewed enthusiasm for barefoot running. Yet, kinetics and/or kinematic observations on modern people walking or running in Minimalist Bare Foot Technology (MBFT) shoes or barefoot are not conclusive. In 14 male rear foot striking runners, when they first took on MBFT shoes and ran on a treadmill, Willy and Davis [2] noticed that they had increased, rather than decreased, load on lower extremities as compared to their standard shoe running. These kinetics and kinematic disadvantages of barefoot and MBFT footwear, have been noticed to be associated with overuse injuries or greater risk of fractures by several previous studies [3, 4]. Using a self-developed relative asymmetry index, Forczek and Staszkiewicz [6] noticed in 54 normal adults (27 women and BioMed Research International (a)
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