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Locomoting through apertures of different width: a study of children with cerebral palsy
G J Savelsbergh1, L Douwes Dekker, A Vermeer
1Faculty of Human Movement Sciences, Free University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
Insights
Children with cerebral palsy (CP) and non-handicapped (NH) children
Area of Science:
- Developmental Psychology
- Biomechanics
- Human Movement Science
Background:
- Children with cerebral palsy (CP) may exhibit differences in visual-spatial processing compared to typically developing peers.
- Understanding how body dimensions influence spatial judgments is crucial for assessing mobility and environmental interaction.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate differences in the use of body-scaled information for judging aperture passability between children with CP and non-handicapped (NH) children.
- To examine how age and mobility status (walking vs. wheelchair-bound) affect these visual-spatial abilities in children with CP.
Main Methods:
- A cohort of 55 children (32 with CP, 23 NH), aged 5-13 years, participated.
- Participants made perceptual judgments and performed locomotion through variable-width openings, assessed using absolute and body-scaled metrics.
- Testing was conducted twice, 12 months apart, to ensure reliability.
Main Results:
- Younger children with CP who could walk showed the least ability to use body-scaled information for judging opening width.
- Older children with CP who were wheelchair-bound and NH children demonstrated the most proficient use of body-scaled information.
- When locomotion performance was adjusted for body width, all groups exhibited comparable outcomes.
Conclusions:
- Action-based learning, where movement informs perception, enhances visual-spatial abilities in both typically developing and CP-affected children.
- The findings suggest that interventions focusing on the interplay between action and perception could benefit children with CP.
- Further research should explore clinical applications for improving spatial navigation and environmental interaction in children with disabilities.
Abstract:
Whether children with cerebral palsy (CP) differ from non-handicapped (NH) children was studied, using body-scaled information about the passability of a doorway-like opening. There were 55 children of whom 23 were NH and 32 had CP, the latter consisting of 12 who could stand and walk unaided (CP-Walk) and 20 confined to a wheelchair (CP-Wheel). All groups were divided into two age ranges (5-8 and 9-13 year) and were tested on two occasions separated by an interval of 12 months. On both occasions, testing involved three consecutive tasks: making perceptual (pre)judgments about the passability of an opening varying in width, actually attempting to locomote through the openings (performance), and another round of (post)judgments. Judgments and performance were expressed in terms of absolute and relative outcomes, the latter differing from the former in accounting for differences in body width relative to aperture width. There were two main findings. Firstly, the younger CP-Walk children were the least able to employ body-scaled information in judging aperture width and the older CP-Wheel and NH the most able. Secondly, when performances in passing through the openings were adjusted for differences in body width, all groups had similar outcomes. This findings lends credence to the notion that when action is used in the service of perception, this is beneficial for the visual-spatial abilities of both NH and CP children. The study concludes by pointing out future directions in this type of research as well as some of the clinical implications of the findings.