title: Age and grip strength predict hand dexterity in adults.
abstract: In the scientific literature, there is much evidence of a relationship between age and dexterity, where increased age is related to slower, less nimble and less smooth, less coordinated and less controlled performances. While some suggest that the relationship is a direct consequence of reduced muscle strength associated to increased age, there is a lack of research that has systematically investigated the relationships between age, strength and hand dexterity. Therefore, the aim of this study was to examine the associations between age, grip strength and dexterity. 107 adults (range 18-93 years) completed a series of hand dexterity tasks (i.e. steadiness, line tracking, aiming, and tapping) and a test of maximal grip strength. We performed three phases of analyses. Firstly, we evaluated the simple relationships between pairs of variables; replicating the existing literature; and found significant relationships of increased age and reduced strength; increased age and reduced dexterity, and; reduced strength and reduced dexterity. Secondly, we used standard Multiple Regression (MR) models to determine which of the age and strength factors accounted for the greater variance in dexterity. The results showed that both age and strength made significant contributions to the data variance, but that age explained more of the variance in steadiness and line tracking dexterity, whereas strength explained more of the variance in aiming and tapping dexterity. In a third phase of analysis, we used MR analyses to show an interaction between age and strength on steadiness hand dexterity. Simple Slopes post-hoc analyses showed that the interaction was explained by the middle to older aged adults showing a relationship between reduced strength and reduced hand steadiness, whereas younger aged adults showed no relationship between strength and steadiness hand dexterity. The results are discussed in terms of how age and grip strength predict different types of hand dexterity in adults.
authors.affiliation: Functional Neuroimaging Group, Department of Radiology, University Hospital Bonn, Sigmund-Freud Str. 25, 53127, Bonn, Germany; Division of Neuropsychology, Hertie-Institute for Clinical Brain Research, Centre for Integrative Neuroscience, Eberhard Karls University, Hoppe-Seyler-Str. 3, 72076, Tübingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Jason A
authors.initials: JA
authors.lastname: Martin
authors.affiliation: School of Health and Population Sciences, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Jill
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ramsay
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport & Exercise Science, University of Worcester, Worcester, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Christopher
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hughes
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport & Exercise Science, University of Worcester, Worcester, United Kingdom; Faculty of Health & Sport Sciences, University of Agder, Kristiansand, Norway.
authors.forename: Derek M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Peters
authors.affiliation: Psychological Sciences Research Institute, Université Catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium; Institute of Neuroscience, Université Catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium.
authors.forename: Martin G
authors.initials: MG
authors.lastname: Edwards
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D006225:Hand / Q000502:physiology*; D018737:Hand Strength / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009048:Motor Skills / Q000502:physiology*; D018908:Muscle Weakness / Q000503:physiopathology; D055815:Young Adult