“Effect of Secondary Cognitive and Motor Tasks on Selected Gait Parameters in Different Age Groups”

Abstract

Since walking is a dynamic activity which is an automatic process and attention demanding task. Dual task while walking may cause changes in gait, therefore this study primarily aims to identify whether a secondary cognitive or motor task would have a greater effect on gait parameters in different age groups. Secondarily, it aims to examine difference in gait performance between young and older adults while performing cognitive and motor tasks. Student’s t- test and Repeated measure analysis of variance was used for Statistical analyses. Older group had significantly higher gait time (mean difference: 2.61,3.86, and 6.37seconds), lower stride length (mean difference: 0.26, 0.25, and 0.28 cm), and higher step width (mean difference: 1.46,1.85, and 3.13cm) during simple walking task, motor task and cognitive task while walking, respectively as compared to young adults.This study concludes that the secondary cognitive task has affect the selected gait parameters more in young and older adults as compared to secondary motor task. Additionally, dual task performance has shown difference between gait of young and older adults