Representational momentum in children born preterm and at term

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Updated: Jun 16, 2026

Preterm EEG: A Multimodal Neurophysiological Protocol
19:32

Preterm EEG: A Multimodal Neurophysiological Protocol

Published on: February 18, 2012

Nicole M Taylor1, Lorna S Jakobson

  • 1Department of Clinical Health Psychology, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, MB, Canada R3E 3N4. taylor@cc.umanitoba.ca

Brain and Cognition
|February 13, 2010
PubMed

Insights

Children born very prematurely show a weaker representational momentum (RM) effect, impacting motion perception. This effect also develops with age in both preterm and term-born children.

Area of Science:

  • Cognitive Psychology
  • Developmental Neuroscience
  • Perceptual Psychology

Background:

  • Representational momentum (RM) describes how memory for moving objects includes motion information, potentially causing location judgment errors.
  • Children born very prematurely often experience challenges with motion perception and motor skills.
  • Understanding RM in this population may illuminate developmental trajectories and underlying mechanisms.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To investigate the representational momentum (RM) effect in children born very prematurely compared to those born at term.
  • To examine age-related changes in the RM effect within these groups.
  • To explore the implications of RM differences for motor planning and execution in preterm populations.

Main Methods:

  • Comparison of the RM effect between very preterm and term-born children.
  • Assessment of the RM effect across different age groups (5-6 years and 7-9 years).
  • Utilizing tasks designed to measure errors in judging the location of moving objects.

Main Results:

  • Children born very prematurely exhibited a weaker or absent RM effect compared to term-born children.
  • A reduced RM effect was observed in younger children (5-6 years) relative to older children (7-9 years) in both groups.
  • These findings indicate that the ability to represent motion in memory develops throughout this age range.

Conclusions:

  • The development of representational momentum (RM) continues into middle childhood.
  • Impaired RM in preterm children may contribute to observed difficulties in fine and gross motor planning.
  • Deficits in predictive modeling or motion extrapolation could have broader developmental consequences.

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