Abstract
Age-dependent gait characteristics and associations with cognition, motor behavior, injuries, and psychosocial functioning were investigated in 138 typically developing children aged 6.7–13.2 years (M = 10.0 years). Gait velocity, normalized velocity, and variability were measured using the walkway system GAITRite without an additional task (single task) and while performing a motor or cognitive task (dual task). Assessment of children’s cognition included tests for intelligence and executive functions; parents reported on their child’s motor behavior, injuries, and psychosocial functioning. Gait variability (an index of gait regularity) decreased with increasing age in both single- and dual-task walking. Dual-task gait decrements were stronger when children walked in the motor compared to the cognitive dual-task condition and decreased with increasing age in both dual-task conditions. Gait alterations from single- to dual-task conditions were not related to children’s cognition, motor behavior, injuries, or psychosocial functioning.
Highlights
Walking is the most important mode of human locomotion (Adolph et al, 2003) and is a remarkably complex motor skill involving neural control systems that produce coordinated limb movements (Hausdorff, 2007)
Pairwise comparisons revealed higher gait velocity in single-task walking compared to both dual-task conditions (p < 0.001) and higher gait velocity in the dual-task condition digits compared to button (p < 0.001)
There was no significant between-subjects effect of age but a significant Walking Condition × Age interaction (Wilks’s multivariate test), F(2,133) = 3.956, p = 0.021, η2 = 0.056: While the effect of age was not significant for single-task walking or the dual-task condition digits, it was significant for the dual-task condition button, such that older children walked with higher gait velocity than younger children when unfastening and fastening a button
Summary
Walking is the most important mode of human locomotion (Adolph et al, 2003) and is a remarkably complex motor skill involving neural control systems that produce coordinated limb movements (Hausdorff, 2007). Performing concurrent tasks, like listening to a conversation while walking, is an everyday behavior Such dual-task situations adversely affect children’s walking, indicating that the regulation of gait requires cognitive processes such as executive and attentional functions (e.g., Cherng et al, 2007). Studies investigating children with developmental impairments have shown that children with motor and cognitive deficits are more vulnerable to dual-task gait decrements than typically developing children (e.g., Cherng et al, 2009; Katz-Leurer et al, 2011). Such decrements, in turn, may affect children’s motor behavior and psychosocial functioning, as it is
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