title: Lifespan development of the bilateral deficit in a simple reaction time task.
abstract: Performing an action at a maximum speed or with a maximum strength simultaneously with two limbs leads to a lower performance than the sum of unimanual performances. This phenomenon is known as bilateral deficit. There is some evidence that the bilateral deficit changes over the lifespan, in a way that children and older adults show lower deficits than young adults. Inverse developmental changes of childrens' and older adults' brain structures connecting both hemispheres, i.e., the corpus callosum, might importantly contribute to this phenomenon. The seemingly similar developments have been observed with different experimental protocols in the different age groups, respectively. To test for similarities and differences in changes of the bilateral deficit at critical periods of the lifespan development of bimanual actions, children, young adults, and older adults performed a simple reaction time task uni- and bimanually. Reaction times and the resulting bilateral deficit, as well as reaction time variability were analyzed. As expected, reaction times were different for the young adults between the uni- and the bimanual task. Children and older adults performed both conditions with similar reaction times. However, a difference in the direction of the %bilateral deficit occurred between the two age groups. The findings demonstrated an absence of the bilateral deficit for children, but not for younger and older adults.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport Science, Saarland University, Campus B8.2, 66041, Saarbrücken, Germany.|Institute of Sports Medicine, University of Paderborn, Paderborn, Germany.
authors.forename: Solveig
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Vieluf
authors.affiliation: Developmental Psychology Unit, Department of Psychology, Saarland University, Saarbrücken, Germany.
authors.forename: Gisa
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Aschersleben
authors.affiliation: Institute of Sport Science, Saarland University, Campus B8.2, 66041, Saarbrücken, Germany. s.panzer@mx.uni-saarland.de.
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-7301-2374
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Panzer
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000375:Aging; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D002648:Child; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011596:Psychomotor Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011597:Psychomotor Performance / Q000502:physiology*; D011930:Reaction Time / Q000502:physiology*; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Aging; Bilateral deficit; Motor development; Uni- and bimanual reaction times