Development of upper limb proprioceptive accuracy in children and adolescents.
This study was designed to determine differences in the proprioceptively guided movements of children (8-10 years) and adolescents (16-18 years). Participants were blindfolded and asked to actively match passively determined target positions of the elbow joint under three matching conditions. Overall, children were less accurate than adolescents in all matching tasks and utilized different kinematic strategies for making the matching movements. Specifically, children made larger absolute errors and utilized matching movements which, compared to adolescents, were of shorter duration and less irregular in terms of their velocity profiles. An assessment of limb asymmetry was also performed revealing a non-dominant arm matching advantage but only for children and only in the task requiring interhemispheric transfer of a memory-based model of limb position. The proprioceptive differences observed in this study are likely the result of experience-driven refinement in the utilization of somatosensory feedback throughout childhood and into adolescence.
Goble
Daniel J
DJ
Motor Control Laboratory, Division of Kinesiology, University of Michigan, 401 Washtenaw Ave., Ann Arbor, MI 48109-2214, USA.
Lewis
Colleen A
CA
Hurvitz
Edward A
EA
Brown
Susan H
SH
D000293:Adolescent; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology; D004292:Dominance, Cerebral / Q000502:physiology; D004551:Elbow Joint / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology; D009949:Orientation / Q000502:physiology; D011434:Proprioception / Q000502:physiology; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology