Age-related changes in children’s cognitive–motor dual tasking: Evidence from a large cross-sectional sample

Children coordinate two tasks simultaneously at several occasions throughout the day; however, this dual-task ability and its development across childhood are poorly understood. Therefore, the current study investigated age-related changes in children’s dualtask ability using a large cross-sectional sample of 8- to 13-yearold children (N = 135). In our dual-task methodology, children were asked to walk across an electronic pathway while performing three concurrent cognitive tasks. These tasks targeted at children’s executive function components: inhibition, switching, and updating skills. Our findings indicate associations between age and children’s stride time variability but not with normalized velocity. Younger children showed higher stride time variability in the dual-task situation as compared with older children after accounting for their single-task performance, intelligence, anthropometric variables, and sex, indicating a more regular gait pattern in older children. Furthermore, age was differently related to children’s accuracy in solving the concurrent cognitive tasks. Whereas age was associated with children’s performance in the updating and switching task, there was no relation between age and children’s inhibitory skills. In addition, our data imply that children’s dualtask ability was associated with a number of individual variables. In particular, children with higher intelligence scores showed fewer errors and girls showed lower stride time variability in the dual tasks. Our results suggest a considerable developmental progression in children’s ability to coordinate two simultaneous tasks across middle childhood. Furthermore, our study qualifies previous dual-task research and implies that heterogeneous findings may be related to a differential involvement of executive function components in the dual task

Interlinking Developmental Domains: Low Motor Skills in Typically Developing Children are Related to Intelligence, Executive Functions, and Behavior

Children develop rapidly over their first decade of life across the three main domains of motor, cognitive, and social-emotional development. The interlink between children’s developmental domains is considered as important for children to develop as a whole. Developmental theories support the notion that motor, cognitive, and social-emotional development are each bidirectionally related. Furthermore, changes through movement in relations to individuals and objects enables interactions which facilitates development. With focus on motor development, children and adolescents often do not reach the recommended amount of daily physical activity. Consequently, restrictions in motor skills may in turn hinder engagements with the environment and social interactions with individuals, which therefore reduce learning opportunities in addition to impacting other developmental processes. To increase the in-depth understanding of these relations, the aim of the current dissertation is to contribute to a more comprehensive understanding of how the development of children in one developmental domain (i.e., motor) relates to their development in the other domains (i.e., cognitive and social-emotional). For this, three studies were conducted assessing standardized test batteries in typically developing children between the ages of 7 to 13 years. The associations between (1) fine motor skills and intelligence, (2) motor skills as well as aerobic fitness and executive functions, and (3) gait and social-emotional behavior were analyzed. Furthermore, the overarching focus was to highlight the dimensional perspective of children who fall within the low end of the typically developing motor ability range, as this dissertation is relevant for considerations in future interventions. To investigate interlinks between developmental domains, hierarchical regressions were conducted in studies 1 and 2 and a multilevel modeling approach was used in study 3. Results of study 1 demonstrated that lower performances in fine motor skills are associated with lower scores in full-scale IQ, perceptual reasoning, and processing speed. Study 2 revealed that lower fine motor skills and lower aerobic fitness were significantly related to lower scores in switching and updating. Furthermore, it was shown that fine motor skills explained additional variance in executive functions above and beyond aerobic fitness. Lastly, study 3 indicated that children with a higher variability in stride length as well as stride velocity showed significantly less prosocial behavior, had more emotional symptoms and demonstrated less risk-taking behavior. In summary, this cumulative dissertation offers new insights on a differentiated view of the interlink between fine and gross motor skills and their associations to intelligence, executive functions and behavior in typically developing children. In addition, this dissertation connects multiple studies for an overarching view of the three core domains of child development. The outlook highlights the theoretical and practical value of physical education in school and after school activities which should be preserved and supported. Lastly, the results suggest that typically developing children with low motor skills will not likely outgrow their deficits but are in need of support in the future

Effects of dual-tasking and methylphenidate on gait in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

Effects of dual tasking on motor processes such as gait have been mainly investigated with healthy adults and clinical older samples whereas studies with clinical samples of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) are rare. Similarly, even though methylphenidate (MPH) is the most often prescribed medication for children with ADHD, the influence of MPH on children's gait under single-task and dual-task situations remains poorly understood. In the current study, children diagnosed with ADHD ( n = 26) came twice to the laboratory, once without and once with MPH medication. They were asked to walk over an electronic walkway without a concurrent task (motor single task) and while solving different cognitive tasks (motor-cognitive dual task). Gait variability and cognitive performance were measured. Children's performance was compared to an age- and sex-matched control sample of typically developing children ( n = 26) who were also tested twice. Results indicated considerable effects of dual tasking on children's gait irrespective of group (ADHD vs. controls), with children diagnosed with ADHD showing more pronounced gait alterations in dual-task situations as compared to controls. Furthermore, MPH medication in children with ADHD enabled them to substantially decrease their stride time variability to a level that was comparable to the level of typically developing children. Overall, our findings support the notion that higher cognitive processes such as attention and executive functions influence gait and that MPH can positively affect cognitive and motor processes such as gait

Relations between fine motor skills and intelligence in typically developing children and children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder

Klupp S, Mohring W, Lemola S, Grob A. Relations between fine motor skills and intelligence in typically developing children and children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. Research in Developmental Disabilities. 2021;110: 103855.Background: The embodied cognition hypothesis implies a close connection between motor and cognitive development. Evidence for these associations is accumulating, with some studies indicating stronger relations in clinical than typically developing samples. Aims: The present study extends previous research and investigates relations between fine motor skills and intelligence in typically developing children (n = 139, 7-13 years) and same-aged children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD, n = 46). In line with previous findings, we hypothesized stronger relations in children with ADHD than in typically developing children. Methods and procedure: Fine motor skills were assessed using the standardized Movement Assessment Battery for Children. Intelligence was measured with the standardized Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children. Outcomes and results: Regression analyses indicated significant relations between fine motor skills and full-scale IQ, perceptual reasoning, working memory, and processing speed. Moderation analyses identified stronger relations between fine motor skills and full-scale IQ, perceptual reasoning, and verbal comprehension in children with ADHD compared to typically developing children. Conclusions and implications: Results suggest a close relation between fine motor skills and intelligence in children with and without ADHD, with children diagnosed with ADHD showing stronger relations. Findings support combined motor-cognitive interventions in treating children with ADHD

Effects of various executive functions on adults' and children's walking

Walking is human's most important locomotion. Until recently, walking was seen as an automated motor task which requires only minimal cognitive resources. However, recent studies indicate that walking requires higher-level cognitive processes such as executive functions. A different line of research suggests that executive functions consist of three core components, i.e., inhibition, switching, and updating. Combining these findings, the present study clarified which executive-function component is most essential for human walking. Applying a dual-task methodology, adults ( n = 37) and 8- to 13-year-old children ( n = 134) walked repeatedly across an electronic pathway while solving an inhibition, switching, and updating task. Both adults and children showed the largest gait alterations in the updating and switching task as opposed to inhibition. Likewise, their cognitive performance revealed the largest performance reductions from single- to dual-task situations in the updating task. Overall, our results highlight remarkable similarities in children's and adults' performance with updating working memory representations and switching between rule sets being the most essential cognitive processes for walking. These findings point to a general gait-cognition process. Results have important theoretical value and hold practical implications for creating effective intervention programs

Age-related changes in children's cognitive-motor dual tasking: Evidence from a large cross-sectional sample

Children coordinate two tasks simultaneously at several occasions throughout the day; however, this dual-task ability and its development across childhood are poorly understood. Therefore, the current study investigated age-related changes in children's dual-task ability using a large cross-sectional sample of 8- to 13-year-old children (N = 135). In our dual-task methodology, children were asked to walk across an electronic pathway while performing three concurrent cognitive tasks. These tasks targeted at children's executive function components: inhibition, switching, and updating skills. Our findings indicate associations between age and children's stride time variability but not with normalized velocity. Younger children showed higher stride time variability in the dual-task situation as compared with older children after accounting for their single-task performance, intelligence, anthropometric variables, and sex, indicating a more regular gait pattern in older children. Furthermore, age was differently related to children's accuracy in solving the concurrent cognitive tasks. Whereas age was associated with children's performance in the updating and switching task, there was no relation between age and children's inhibitory skills. In addition, our data imply that children's dual-task ability was associated with a number of individual variables. In particular, children with higher intelligence scores showed fewer errors and girls showed lower stride time variability in the dual tasks. Our results suggest a considerable developmental progression in children's ability to coordinate two simultaneous tasks across middle childhood. Furthermore, our study qualifies previous dual-task research and implies that heterogeneous findings may be related to a differential involvement of executive function components in the dual task

Thigh muscle segmentation of chemical shift encoding-based water-fat magnetic resonance images: The reference database MyoSegmenTUM.

Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) can non-invasively assess muscle anatomy, exercise effects and pathologies with different underlying causes such as neuromuscular diseases (NMD). Quantitative MRI including fat fraction mapping using chemical shift encoding-based water-fat MRI has emerged for reliable determination of muscle volume and fat composition. The data analysis of water-fat images requires segmentation of the different muscles which has been mainly performed manually in the past and is a very time consuming process, currently limiting the clinical applicability. An automatization of the segmentation process would lead to a more time-efficient analysis. In the present work, the manually segmented thigh magnetic resonance imaging database MyoSegmenTUM is presented. It hosts water-fat MR images of both thighs of 15 healthy subjects and 4 patients with NMD with a voxel size of 3.2x2x4 mm3 with the corresponding segmentation masks for four functional muscle groups: quadriceps femoris, sartorius, gracilis, hamstrings. The database is freely accessible online at https://osf.io/svwa7/?view_only=c2c980c17b3a40fca35d088a3cdd83e2. The database is mainly meant as ground truth which can be used as training and test dataset for automatic muscle segmentation algorithms. The segmentation allows extraction of muscle cross sectional area (CSA) and volume. Proton density fat fraction (PDFF) of the defined muscle groups from the corresponding images and quadriceps muscle strength measurements/neurological muscle strength rating can be used for benchmarking purposes

PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in hamstring muscles.

<p>PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in hamstring muscles.</p

PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in gracilis muscle.

<p>PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in gracilis muscle.</p

PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in sartorius anterior muscle.

<p>PDFF and muscle volume of healthy volunteers and patients in sartorius anterior muscle.</p