Children's and adults' predictive saccades to square-wave targets

Predictive saccades to square-wave targets were investigated in school age children and adults at target frequencies of 0.25, 0.5, 0.75, 1.0 and 1.25 Hz. Both children and adults showed predictive tracking that was greatest at the middle of the frequency range, but children's saccade latencies were greater than those of adults at frequencies of 0.5 Hz and above. The variability of saccade latencies for children and adults were comparable. These results were interpreted as indicating that both children's and adults' oculomotor systems include a prediction operator and respond to predictable stimuli in qualitatively similar, although quantitatively different, ways.