The Effect Of Comprehensive Coordination Training On Children's Cognitive Function

Abstract

PURPOSE: The aim of this study was to investigate the impact of comprehensive coordination training on children's cognitive function by adding two extracurricular exercises per week. METHODS: A sample of 120 children aged 7-9 years old who participated in the "MQ101" program were randomly divided into two groups. The experimental group consisted of 58 people and the control group of 62 people. The experimental group participated in extracurricular comprehensive coordination training for 12 weeks, 2 times a week, and 1 hour each time. The control group did not participate in specialized training courses (not limiting students' self-exercise). The height, weight, 50-meter run, Body Comprehensive Coordination Test (BCCT) and the Eriksen Flanker test were tested in the pre-post experiment. The independent sample T-test and factor analysis were used to analyze the change values between the experimental group and the control group. RESULTS: The two groups had no significant demographic differences in age, gender, height, weight, physical fitness tests or BCCT before the experiment. After the experiment, height, weight, and 50-meters-run had significantly changed in two groups (p<0.05). However, regarding a body comprehensive coordination test, only the experimental group has significant differences before (29.75± 6.75) and after (32.80± 5.21) the experiment (p<0.05).The results of Flanker test indicated that the post-test period had a higher accuracy rate in both congruent (95.27 % ± 9.76) and incongruent (91.03 % ± 6.97) trials compared with those in the pre-test period (84.7% ± 10.29 and 73.69 % ± 7.79, respectively) in the experimental group. Additionally, no significant differences were found in the reaction time between the experimental group and the control group. CONCLUSIONS: Comprehensive coordination training has a great impact on the development of children's coordination skills. In addition, behavioral testing results also suggest that coordinative training may specifically benefit prefrontal-dependent tasks in the immature brain state of children aged 7-9 years old by increasing the allocation of attention resources and enhancing the efficiency of neurocognitive processing. (This study was supported by NPOPSS Grant 15CTY011.)