title: Gait adaptation on surfaces with different degrees of slipperiness.
abstract: Gait adaptation to employ different ways to avoid a potential slip is needed to continue walking safely on a new surface, especially when transitioning to a slippery surface. In this experiment, participants walked back and forth five times (trials) on surfaces with different degrees of slipperiness. The results show that trial 1 was significantly different from other trials for most of the dependent variables, especially for the low and high friction conditions. Kinematics on high and medium friction surfaces were very similar, but more adjustments were needed for low friction surfaces. The data for the first trial reflect gait after walking for 2.4 m on the walkway, not the first step onto the walkway. The current data show that gait adaptation continued beyond the first trial. Since participants in this experiment were aware of the floor conditions, the results could have important safety implications that user awareness alone might be insufficient for safe floor designs.
authors.affiliation: Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety, Hopkinton, MA 01748, USA. Electronic address: Wen.Chang@LibertyMutual.com.
authors.forename: Wen-Ruey
authors.initials: WR
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.affiliation: Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, National Tsing Hua University, Hsinchu, Taiwan, ROC.
authors.forename: Chien-Chi
authors.initials: CC
authors.lastname: Chang
authors.affiliation: Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety, Hopkinton, MA 01748, USA.
authors.forename: Mary F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: Lesch
authors.affiliation: Liberty Mutual Research Institute for Safety, Hopkinton, MA 01748, USA.
authors.forename: Simon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Matz
mesh_terms: D000222:Adaptation, Physiological; D000328:Adult; D001364:Awareness; D001696:Biomechanical Phenomena; D005260:Female; D005430:Floors and Floorcoverings; D017276:Friction; D005684:Gait / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D016138:Walking / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Coefficient of friction; Friction utilization; Gait adaptation; Human locomotion