Community-located run training improved aerobic capacity, functional mobility, visuospatial memory, fatigue, and quality of life and pallidum volume in pwMS.

The present study examines whether nonactive older adults are more dependent on visual information when executing aiming movements and whether age-related declines in proprioception play a mediating role herein. Young (N = 40) and older adults (N = 38) were divided into physically active and non-active subgroups based on self-reported sports participation levels. In experiment 1, participants executed wrist-aiming movements with and without visual feedback. In experiment 2, passive proprioceptive acuity was assessed using wrist motion detection and position matching tests. Results showed similar aiming accuracy across age groups both with and without visual feedback, but older adults exhibited longer movement times, prolonged homing-in phase, and made more corrective submovements. Passive proprioceptive acuity was significantly affected by physical activity level and age, with participants in the active group scoring better than their non-active peers. However, these declines did not predict performance changes on the aiming task. Taken together, our observations suggest that decline in proprioceptive acuity did not predict performance changes on the aiming task and older adults were able to compensate for their decreased motion and position sense when allowed sufficient time. In line with these observations, we proposed that older adults are able to compensate for their decline in proprioception by increasing their reliance on predictive models.

Aging impacts on our ability to perform goal-directed aiming movements. Older adults generally make slower and shorter initial impulses towards the end target, and therefore require more time for corrections in the final movement stage. Recent studies however suggest that a physically active lifestyle may attenuate these age-related changes. Also, it remains unclear whether eye-movement control exhibits a similar pattern of adaptation in older adults. Therefore, the first aim of this study was to describe how age and physical activity level impact eye-hand coordination during discrete manual aiming. Young and older participants were divided into physically active and sedentary subgroups, and performed discrete aiming movements while hand and eye movements were recorded. Secondly, to determine whether older adults depend more on vision during aiming, the task was repeated without visual feedback. The results revealed that the typical age-related hand movement adaptations were not only observed in older, but also in sedentary young participants. Older and sedentary young participants also spent more hand movement time after the eyes fixated the end target. This finding does not necessarily reflect an augmented reliance on vision, as all groups showed similar aiming errors when visual feedback was removed. In conclusion, both age and physical activity level clearly impacted eye-hand coordination during discrete manual aiming. This adapted coordination pattern seems to be caused by other factors than an increased reliance on vision.

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Older adults traditionally adapt their discrete aiming movements, thereby traveling a larger proportion of the movement under closed-loop control. As the beneficial impact of a physically active lifestyle in older age has been described for several aspects of motor control, we compared the aiming performance of young controls to active and sedentary older adults. To additionally determine the contribution of visual feedback, aiming movements were executed with and without saccades. Results showed only sedentary older adults adopted the typical movement changes, highlighting the impact of a physically active lifestyle on manual aiming in older age. In an attempt to reveal the mechanism underlying the movement changes, evidence for an age-related decline in force control was found, which in turn resulted in an adapted aiming strategy. Finally, prohibiting saccades did not affect older adults’ performance to a greater extent, suggesting they do not rely more on visual feedback than young controls.