Different individuals learn different solutions to the same perceptual-motor task regardless of the fact that they may undergo the same practice conditions. In the current study, we characterized individual solutions to a perceptual-motor task. Eighteen self-declared right-handed participants were requested to intercept a moving target controlling…

Longitudinal measurement enables the examination of behavioral or psychological change. One approach to examining longitudinal measurements is the use of latent growth curve modeling (LGCM). This approach affords the assessment of inter- and intraindividual change. Yet, this approach likely is underused in exercise science. The purpose of the…

Learning to descend stairs requires motor and cognitive capacities on the part of infants and opportunities for practice and assurance of safety offered by caregivers. The American Academy of Pediatrics prescribes the age strategy to teach toddlers to safely descend stairs but without much consideration for individual differences in infants'…

Motor learning principles guide treatment of childhood apraxia of speech (CAS). Previous studies found children to benefit from higher-intensity conditions; however, they did not control for the total amount of therapy time. The aims of the article are to examine the effects of high versus low treatment frequency in intervention for CAS in…

In executing purposeful actions, adults select sufficient and necessary limbs. But infants often move goal-irrelevant limbs, suggesting a developmental process of motor specialization. Two experiments with 9- and 12-month-olds revealed gradual decreases in extraneous movements in non-acting limbs during unimanual actions. In Experiment 1,…

Impaired motor cognition may underpin empathy problems in autism. The actions and feelings questionnaire (AFQ), designed to examine individual differences in motor cognition, was completed fully by 1391 adults, of whom 326 reported a diagnosis of an autism spectrum condition (ASC). A confirmatory factor analysis supported a 3 factor model. The AFQ…

Growth, maturation, and development dominate the daily lives of children and adolescents for approximately the first 2 decades of life. Growth and maturation are biological processes, while development is largely a behavioral process. The 3 processes occur simultaneously and interact. They can be influenced by physical activity and also can…

Previous research has shown an association between children's development of psychosocial and motor skills. This study evaluated the development of these skills in 301 three-year-old deaf and hard of hearing children (M: 37.8 months) and considered a range of possible predictors including gender, birth weight, age at first fitting with hearing…

Language development has long been associated with motor development, particularly manual gesture. We examined a variety of motor abilities--manual gesture including symbolic, meaningless and sequential memory, oral motor control, gross and fine motor control--in 129 children aged 21 months. Language abilities were assessed and cognitive and…

Bruner's (1973) review of infant skill development is updated and extended by (a) placing it in the context of recent motor learning research; (b) discussing the concept of efference in its most recent conceptualization; and (c) explicating certain implicit themes relevant to a theory of infant motor intelligence. (ED)

Naturalistic observation of a set of identical twins revealed many differences in personality and motor development. (MS)

This study was designed to determine the extent to which (speech) motor timing control, as defined by a statistical model, improves in consistency with age and the degree to which peripheral feedback is used by children to maintain this consistency. Clinical applications and possible genetic implications are discussed. (Author/ED)