Motor Imagery Development in Children: Changes in Speed and Accuracy With Increasing Age

Abstract

Although motor imagery has been pointed as a promising strategy for the rehabilitation of children with neurological disorders, information on their development throughout childhood and adolescence is still scarce. For instance, it is still unclear at what age they reach a development comparable to the motor imagery performance observed in adults. Herein we used a mental rotation task to assess motor imagery in 164 typically developing children and adolescents, which were divided into four age groups (6-7, 8-9, 10-11, and 12-13 years) and 30 adults. The effects of biomechanical constraints, accuracy, and reaction time of the mental rotation task were considered. ANOVA showed that all groups had the effect of biomechanical restrictions of the mental rotation task. We found a group effect for accuracy [F (4, 180) = 17,560; p < 0.00; η² = 3.79] and reaction time [F (4, 180) = 17.5; p < 0.001, η² = 0.615], with the results of children groups 6-7 and 8-9 years being significantly lower than the other groups (p < 0.05). In all the analyses, there were no differences regarding accuracy and reaction time among the participants of the age groups 10-11 and 12-13 years and adults (p > 0.05). Concluding, children aged 6-7 years were able to perform motor imagery, motor imagery ability improved as the participants' ages increased, and children aged 10 and over-performed similarly to adults.

Motor imagery in children with unilateral cerebral palsy: a case–control study

“…Studies that applied the HLJ task to children and adults with typical development reported that the reaction time of medially oriented stimuli (Fig. 1) is biomechanically easier to perform, resulting in shorter reaction times compared with stimuli oriented laterally 12 …”

“…1) is biomechanically easier to perform, resulting in shorter reaction times compared with stimuli oriented laterally. 12 Results of studies using the HLJ task to study motor imagery ability in individuals with unilateral CP are heterogeneous. Mutsaarts et al 13 reported that only individuals with right-sided unilateral CP could not perform motor imagery.…”

Effect of Motor Imagery Training on Motor Learning in Children and Adolescents: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

“…However, Butson et al (2014) [ 43 ] found that most of the children five to six years old included in the study were only able to perform with an accuracy of below 50% of that of adults. In general, the accuracy of performance in mental rotation tasks increases with age during childhood while children aged ten and over eleven perform similar to adults [ 50 ].…”

“…The development of MI ability has been extensively studied in children without impairments [ 42 , 50 ]. More recently, a few studies on MI ability in children with motor deficits such as development coordination disorder (DCD) [ 51 , 52 , 53 ] or cerebral palsy (CP) have been conducted [ 54 ].…”

Deep and Wide Transfer Learning with Kernel Matching for Pooling Data from Electroencephalography and Psychological Questionnaires

“…Motor imagery (MI) is related to the process of mentally generating a quasi-perceptual experience in the absence of any appropriate external stimuli [ 1 ]. MI practice promotes children’s motor learning and has been suggested to provide benefits in enhancing the musicality of untrained children [ 2 , 3 ], in evaluating the screen-time and cognitive development [ 4 ], and improving attentional focus and rehabilitation [ 5 , 6 , 7 ], among others. MI-based brain–computer interface (BCI) systems often entail electroencephalogram (EEG)-decoding because of their ease of use, safety, high portability, relatively low cost, and, most importantly, high temporal resolution [ 8 ].…”