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Postural control and head stability during natural gaze behaviour in 6- to 12-year-old children
A M Schärli1, R van de Langenberg, K Murer
1Institute of Human Movement Science and Sports, ETH Zürich, Wolfgang-Pauli-Str. 27, 8093 Zurich, Switzerland. andrea.schaerli@hest.ethz.ch
Insights
Children
Area of Science:
- Developmental neuroscience
- Biomechanics
- Motor control
Background:
- Postural control is essential for daily activities.
- Gaze behavior significantly influences postural stability.
- The developmental trajectory of gaze-postural control coupling is not well understood.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the developmental changes in postural control during natural exploratory gaze behavior from childhood to adulthood.
- To determine how head movements during visual exploration impact postural stability across different age groups.
- To elucidate the relationship between gaze-related head movements and postural control in developing individuals.
Main Methods:
- Cross-sectional study comparing 6-, 9-, 12-year-olds, and young adults.
- Measured 3D head rotations and center of pressure (COP) excursions during quiet stance with fixed and exploratory gaze conditions.
- Exploratory gaze was elicited by viewing an animated film.
Main Results:
- Head rotation and COP displacement decreased with age across both conditions.
- Head movement was consistently greater during exploratory gaze in all age groups.
- Children, unlike adults, exhibited significantly greater COP displacement with exploratory gaze.
- Strong positive correlations were found between head rotation and medial-lateral COP displacement.
Conclusions:
- The contribution of head movement to gaze stabilization decreases with age.
- Head instability from gaze-related movements is a key factor limiting children's postural control.
- Impaired head stabilization during visual exploration may hinder children's performance in combined postural and visual tasks.
Abstract:
We investigated how the influence of natural exploratory gaze behaviour on postural control develops from childhood into adulthood. In a cross-sectional design, we compared four age groups: 6-, 9-, 12-year-olds and young adults. Two experimental trials were performed: quiet stance with a fixed gaze (fixed) and quiet stance with natural exploratory gaze behaviour (exploratory). The latter was elicited by having participants watch an animated short film on a large screen in front of them. 3D head rotations in space and centre of pressure (COP) excursions on the ground plane were measured. Across conditions, both head rotation and COP displacement decreased with increasing age. Head movement was greater in the exploratory condition in all age groups. In all children-but not in adults-COP displacement was markedly greater in the exploratory condition. Bivariate correlations across groups showed highly significant positive correlations between COP displacement in ML direction and head rotation in yaw, roll, and pitch in both conditions. The regularity of COP displacements did not show a clear developmental trend, which indicates that COP dynamics were qualitatively similar across age groups. Together, the results suggest that the contribution of head movement to eye-head saccades decreases with age and that head instability-in part resulting from such gaze-related head movements-is an important limiting factor in children's postural control. The lack of head stabilisation might particularly affect children in everyday activities in which both postural control and visual exploration are required.
