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Bimanual coordination in children: manipulation of object distance

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Abstract

The performance of many everyday activities requires the coordination of the two upper limbs to achieve the goal of the task. Although bimanual performance has been studied in detail in adults, few studies have examined how children coordinate the movements of the two hands during symmetric and asymmetric bimanual prehension. With the current study, we asked younger (4–6 years, n = 14) and older (7–10 years, n = 16) children to complete a discrete bimanual task. Specifically, they reached to grasp cylinders located at near and far positions in either unimanual or bimanual condition. During bimanual symmetric conditions, participants performed movements with both hands toward two objects located at the same distance (both near or both far), while in the bimanual asymmetric conditions, they reached for objects at different distances. Results of the kinematic analyses indicated that the young children consistently experienced the “two target” effect, whereby bimanual movements were executed more slowly than unimanual movements to the same distance. Older children employed a hybrid strategy, exhibiting slower movements in bimanual congruent conditions, but larger non-dominant apertures in bimanual incongruent conditions. This hybrid strategy was hypothesized to stem from developmental changes occurring in the integration of sensory information around 8 years of age. While older children exhibited temporal and spatial coordination patterns that were similar to patterns reported in adults, large relative timing differences at the start and end of bimanual movements and considerably weaker spatial coupling were seen in the younger children.

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Notes

  1. Although reach distance and target size were scaled for each participant, the lateral distance from the midline to the start position (i.e., 15 cm to the right and left) was not. Anthropometric data indicate an average chest breadth of 26.8 cm for children aged 4–6 and 30.7 for children aged 7–10. Therefore, for the older children, reach movements were performed in the parasagittal plane extending from the shoulder. In contrast for the younger children, movements were made in a plane that was approximately 1.5 cm lateral to the shoulder plane. Although we do not expect that this biomechanical difference should influence temporal coordination between the limbs, it should be considered when interpreting the results.

  2. Note that there is no hand factor in this analysis because the timing values represent the right hand minus the left hand.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Andrew Minkley for his help with data analysis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Kinesiology, University of Wisconsin–Madison, Madison, WI, 53706, USA

    Andrea H. Mason, Jennifer L. Bruyn & Jo-Anne C. Lazarus

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  1. Andrea H. Mason
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  2. Jennifer L. Bruyn
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  3. Jo-Anne C. Lazarus
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Correspondence to Andrea H. Mason.

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Mason, A.H., Bruyn, J.L. & Lazarus, JA.C. Bimanual coordination in children: manipulation of object distance. Exp Brain Res 231, 153–164 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00221-013-3678-y

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