Extracurricular Sports Improve Balance Skills in Children With Visual Disability

Abstract

The importance of the visual abilities for the normal balance skills is well studied. However, it is not fully clarified how the severity of visual impairment of children and adolescents disturbs the balance and the impact of physical activity on this component of fitness. This study is aiming at establishing the importance of extracurricular physical activity on the balance abilities of school-aged children with visual disabilities considering their sex, age, and degree of impairment. Two hundred and nineteen children and adolescents with visual impairment, aged between 12 and 19 years, participated in this study. The participants were divided into groups according to the age (12-14 y., 15-17 y., and 18-19 y.), sex, visual impairment (with low vision and blind), and level of physical activity (with and without extracurricular sport participation). The balance skills were measured by the time in seconds for single-leg balancing. Ordinary statistic for describing variations was employed. The balance skills of visually impaired children increased with age. There were no significant differences (p<0.05) in the balance between the sexes in all age groups. Balance skills comparison of the children, having different degrees of visual impairment also registered similar results in both groups. The female and male children and adolescents from all age groups who participated in extracurricular sports scored better in the balance test (p<0.05). This study characterized the balance skills of children with different levels of visual disability across age in both sexes, and confirmed the positive effect of physical activity on this fitness component.