Predictive motor control in children with developmental coordination disorder: Mechanisms and intervention

Contains fulltext : 178598.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Radboud University, 11 januari 2018Promotor : Steenbergen, B. Co-promotor : Lust, J.M.244 p

Nieuwe inzichten in de motorische problemen bij DCD en mogelijkheden voor training

Kinderen met Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) ervaren motorische problemen tijdens het uitvoeren van vele activiteiten. Deze kinderen hebben problemen met de coördinatie van zowel de fijne motoriek (bijv. schrijven, veters strikken) als de grove motoriek (bijv. een bal gooien, hinkelen). Deze motorische problemen hebben invloed op het dagelijks functioneren van deze kinderen en op hun schoolprestaties. Uit recente studies komt naar voren dat problemen met het voorspellen van de uitkomst van een geïnitieerde beweging een mogelijk belangrijke bijdrage levert aan de motorische problemen bij DCD. Deze studies hebben zowel motorische inbeelding als motorische planning onder de loep genomen. In dit artikel bespreken we drie vragen: 1) Welk bewijs is er dat kinderen met DCD moeite hebben met het voorspellen van de uitkomst van een beweging? 2) Hoe verandert deze vaardigheid om motorisch in te beelden en te plannen in de loop van de tijd bij kinderen met DCD? 3) Is het motorische inbeeldingsvermogen te trainen bij kinderen met DCD en heeft dat effect op het motorisch functioneren

Feasibility of motor imagery training for children with developmental coordination disorder: A pilot study

Contains fulltext : 175223.pdf (publisher's version ) (Open Access)Children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) experience movement difficulties that may be linked to processes involved in motor imagery (MI). This paper discusses recent advances in theory that underpin the use of motor imagery (MI) training for children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). This knowledge is translated in a new MI training protocol which is compared with the Cognitive Orientation to daily Occupational Performance (CO-OP). Children meeting DSM-5 criteria for DCD were assigned to MI (n=4) or CO-OP (n=4) interventions and completed 9 treatment sessions, including homework exercises. Results were positive, with two children in the MI group and three in the CO-OP group improving their m-ABC-2 score by >= 2 standard scores, interpreted as a clinically meaningful change. Moreover, all children and parents noticed improvements in motor skills after training. This is the first study to demonstrate the feasibility of a theoretically principled treatment protocol for MI training in children with DCD, and extends earlier work.9 p

Development of motor imagery and anticipatory action planning in children with developmental coordination disorder: A longitudinal approach

Contains fulltext : 176989.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access)Children with impaired motor coordination (or Development Coordination Disorder - DCD) have difficulty with the predictive control of movements, evidenced by cross-sectional studies that show impaired motor imagery and action planning abilities. What remains unclear is whether this deficit in predictive control reflects immaturity of the motor system (a developmental delay) or some deviation from normal development (a disorder). To advance this discussion the present study used a longitudinal design to examine the development of motor imagery and action planning in children with DCD. Thirty children were included in the DCD group (aged 6-11 years) and age- and gender-matched to 30 controls. The DCD group had a mABC-2 score = 20th percentile. Motor imagery was assessed with the hand rotation task, action planning with a test for end-state comfort. Children participated in three measurements, with one year in between measurements. Results showed that children with DCD were slower and less accurate than their typically developing peers in all subsequent years but were able to improve their motor imagery ability over time. Furthermore, children with DCD showed less planning for ESC at the start of the present study, but were able to catch up with their peers during two-year follow up. These results exemplify that improvement of motor imagery and action planning ability is possible in DCD, and they lend theoretical support to the use of new training techniques that focus on training motor imagery to improve motor skills in children with DCD.11 p

Text and Contextual Conditioning in Spoken English: A genre approach

This study brings together two approaches to linguistic variation, Hallidayan systemic-functional grammar and Labovian variation theory, and in doing so brings together a functional interpretation of language and its empirical investigation in its social context. The study reports on an empirical investigation of the concept of text. The investigation proceeds on the basis of a corpus of texts gathered in sociolinguistic interviews with fifty adult speakers of Australian English in Sydney. The total corpus accounted for in terms of text type or genre numbers 420 texts of varying length, 125 of which, produced in response to four narrative questions, are investigated in greater detail in respect both of the types of text they constitute as well as of some of their linguistic realisations. These largely narrative-type texts, which represent between two and three hours of spoken English and total approximately 53000 words, are presented in a second volume analysed in terms of their textual or generic structure as well as their realisation at the level of the clause complex. The study explores in some detail models of register and genre developed within systemic-functional linguistics, adopting a genre model developed by J.R. Martin and others working within his model which foregrounds the notion that all aspects of the system(s) involved are related to one another probabilistically. In order to investigate the concept of text in actual discourse under conditions which permit us to become sufficiently confident of our understanding of it to proceed to generalisations about text and its contextual conditioning in spoken discourse, we turn to Labovian methods of sociolinguistic inquiry, i.e. to quantitative methods or methods of quantifying linguistic choice. The study takes the sociolinguistic interview as pioneered by Labov in his study of phonological variation in New York City and develops it for the purpose of investigating textual variation. The question of methodology constitutes a substantial part of the study, contributing in the process to a much greater understanding of the very phenomenon of text in discourse, for example by addressing itself to the question of the feasibility of operationalising a concept of text in the context of spoken discourse. The narrative-type texts investigated in further detail were found to range on a continuum from most experientially-oriented texts such as procedure and recount at one end to the classic narrative of personal experience and anecdote to the increasingly interpersonally-oriented exemplum and observation, both of which become interpretative of the real world in contrast to the straightforwardly representational slant taken on the same experience by the more experientially-oriented texts. The explanation for the generic variation along this continuum must be sought in a system of generic choice which is essentially cultural. A quantitative analysis of clausal theme and clause complex-type relations was carried out, the latter by means of log-linear analysis, in order to investigate their correlation with generic structure. While it was possible to relate the choice of theme to the particular stages of generic structures, clause complex-type relations are chosen too infrequently to be related to stages and were thus related to genres as a whole. We find that while by and large the choice of theme correlates well with different generic stages, it only discriminates between different genres, i.e. generic structures in toto, for those genres which are maximally different. Similarly, investigating the two choices in the principal systems involved in the organisation of the clause complex, i.e. the choice of taxis (parataxis vs. hypotaxis) and the (grammatically independent) choice of logico-semantic relations (expansion vs. projection), we find that both those choices discriminate better between types more distant on a narrative continuum. The log-linear analysis of clause complex-type relations also permitted the investigation of the social characteristics of speakers. We found that the choice of logico-semantic relations correlates with genre and question, while the choice of taxis correlates with a speaker's sex and his membership of some social group (in addition to genre). Parataxis is favoured by men and by members of the group lowest in the social hierarchy. Age on the other hand is not significant in the choice of taxis at all. In other words, since social factors are clearly shown to be significant in the making of abstract grammatical choices where they cannot be explained in terms of the functional organisation of text, we conclude that social factors must be made part of a model of text in order to fully account for its contextual conditioning. The study demonstrates that an understanding of the linguistic properties of discourse requires empirical study and, conversely, that it is possible to study discourse empirically without relaxing the standards of scientific inquiry

Ervaringen van ouders in Nederland met betrekking tot het verkrijgen van een DCD-diagnose voor hun kind

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Action planning and position sense in children with developmental coordination disorder

The present study examined action planning and position sense in children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD). Participants performed two action planning tasks, the sword task and the bar grasping task, and an active elbow matching task to examine position sense. Thirty children were included in the DCD group (aged 6-10 years) and age-matched to 90 controls. The DCD group had a MABC-2 total score ≤5th percentile, the control group a total score ≥25th percentile. Results from the sword-task showed that children with DCD planned less for end-state comfort. On the bar grasping task no significant differences in planning for end-state comfort between the DCD and control group were found. There was also no significant difference in the position sense error between the groups. The present study shows that children with DCD plan less for end-state comfort, but that this result is task-dependent and becomes apparent when more precision is needed at the end of the task. In that respect, the sword-task appeared to be a more sensitive task to assess action planning abilities, than the bar grasping task. The action planning deficit in children with DCD cannot be explained by an impaired position sense during active movements

Role of pediatric physical therapists in promoting sports participation in developmental coordination disorder

Contains fulltext : 189846.pdf (Publisher’s version ) (Open Access)Purpose: To explore the role of pediatric physical therapists (PPT) in promoting sports participation in children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD) and identify associated barriers and facilitators. Methods: Questionnaires were provided to 243 PPTs. Qualitative, semistructured, in-depth interviews were administered with the PPTs, children with DCD, and parents. Results: Approximately 67% of questionnaires were returned. Approximately 46% of PPTs were active in guiding children with DCD to sports clubs. This guidance was facilitated by knowledge of local sports, clubs that include children with DCD, and contact persons. Barriers to sports participation were the motor impairment or coincident disorder, insufficient participants to compose a team, and lack of guidance on how to include children with DCD. Conclusions: PPTs currently guide children with DCD to sports clubs, but this guidance may be improved by connecting them to special exercise programs and mainstream sports clubs and examining children's experiences during sports.6 p