Abstract
Lack of adequate physical activity in children is an epidemic that can result in obesity and other poor health outcomes across the lifespan. Physical activity interventions focused on motor skill competence continue to be developed, but some interventions, such as neuromuscular training (NMT), may be limited in how early they can be implemented due to dependence on the child’s level of cognitive and perceptual-motor development. Early implementation of motor-rich activities that support motor skill development in children is critical for the development of healthy levels of physical activity that carry through into adulthood. Virtual reality (VR) training may be beneficial in this regard. VR training, when grounded in an information-based theory of perceptual-motor behavior that modifies the visual information in the virtual world, can promote early development of motor skills in youth akin to more natural, real-world development as opposed to strictly formalized training. This approach can be tailored to the individual child and training scenarios can increase in complexity as the child develops. Ultimately, training in VR may help serve as a precursor to “real-world” NMT, and once the child reaches the appropriate training age can also augment more complex NMT regimens performed outside of the virtual environment.
Highlights
While we have suggested similar interventions for real-world neuromuscular training (NMT) [46], technology-integrated gamification would allow for an additional level of immersion and a fine-grained tuning of parameters that would allow for a more complete integration of fundamental training concepts with aspects of play
Immersive virtual environment scenarios have the potential as important tools in the prevention and treatment of physical inactivity; much more work is needed to utilize them efficiently and effectively
Many outstanding issues still need to be addressed to understand the efficacy of FULLY IMMERSIVE VIRTUAL ENVIRONMENTS (FIVEs) scenarios for use with children under the age of 7 and how to appropriately design and implement visual environments to be most effective for training
Summary
Physical activity interventions focused on motor skill competence continue to be developed, but some interventions, such as neuromuscular training (NMT), may be limited in how early they can be implemented due to dependence on the child’s level of cognitive and perceptual-motor development. The high prevalence of overweight and obese children continues to be a major public health problem [1] Myriad factors underlie this etiology, with physical inactivity identified as a primary cause [2], and one potential mechanism is that many children are not developing the motor skill repertoire and movement confidence at a rate necessary to initiate and maintain a healthy level of physical activity [3, 4].
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