Standing Posture Control in Chinese Adults: Age and Gender Differences

Abstract

Aging is likely to be accompanied by changes in postural control and these changes might be gender related. The purpose of this study was to investigate the standing postural control of Chinese adults in relation to age and gender. Seventeen healthy older (female=8, male=9) and young (female=9, male=8) adults participated in the study. The subjects stood barefoot on a force platform and perform, sequentially, quiet stance with eyes open (QSEO) and eyes closed (QSEC), Romberg stance with eyes open and eyes closed, and tandem stance (TS) for 20 sec each task. The trajectory of the center of pressure (COP) on the transverse plane, and the range of displacement, velocity, and root mean square (RMS) of the COP on the mediolateral (ML) and anteroposterior (AP) planes were examined. It was found that, compared to young adults, older females had significantly smaller ML RMS in QSEC, velocity in QSEO and range in TS, while older males were found to show greater trajectory and velocity in TS. Males were found to have greater ML velocity in QSEC, and greater trajectory, ML range, and velocity in TS. In QSEC, the ML range and velocity were greater in females than males. These findings indicated that aging did not have consistent effect on older adults of different genders. Future studies on aging postural control should take into account of the gender effects.