Testing kinaesthetic acuity in preschool children

Abstract

Attempts to dauibc the kinatstbctic d e v d o p n t of young children have ban limited by the use of trdo which ue desigocd for OldalAldrm dinappropnrte ' fortutingthoseofprrJchoolage.Atask r m~~c of I 3to Qyar-old group compared with that of a 5 to dycar-old p u p . The task involved a passive hnd movement to 1 of 16 positions With the hand hidden from the child's view, tlle child identifying the position to which tbeirhnnd had kxn moved by 8 vabal nsponse (naming the aaimal picrund at that loution). The results indicated tbat children as young 1s 3 yean of age have considarbk kinaes tbctic sensitivity. and that by 5 to 6yean theabilitytolltilisekimatb& 'c cues to identify hiad position is very goo6 The older p p pafonned significantly bctta than UIC younger group. A sex diffmncc in kinresthetic acuity at 3 to 4 years of age was also revuled, with boys of this age performing more accurately than girls. This difference was not evident in children of 5 to 6 yean of age. designed spodfidy to ttStkiIuuh& 'c acuity in pruchool aged children was developed and the pator-Kinauthjia is the sense of movement and position. This sense arises from a number of kinaesthetic receptors which include muscle spindks, tendon organs. joint receptors, md skin lccep tors, dl of which contribute to the global &on of k i n a a hsis (Mccloskey, 1978). Kinacsthcsl 'a has been &bed a role in the learning and performance of motor tasks but, as pointed out by Laszlo md B h w (1983). the contribution of this modality has been neglected in comparison to the visual, auditory and tactik &tics.Consequently, little is known of the maturat i d changes in kinaestbesis.An attempt to cOmct this situation was made by Laszlo and BairJtow (1980BairJtow ( , 1983BairJtow ( . 1985 using their Kinautheb 'c Sensitivity. evidence presented by Bairstow and Laszlo (1981) that angle Address for conespondence: Dr David Livesey, aparbnmt of Psyddogy, The W s i t y of S-y. NSW 2006, Aust~alia. krstrdian kumd of psychokgy V d 47, No. 3.1995 pp. 160-163 Imagery, IS. 143-150. Miller. S. (1971). Visual and haptic cue utiliuton by pruchool children: The recognition of visual and haptic stimuli presented scpnratcly and togetbcr. Journal OfErpCrimenrai ChildPsychology, 12.88-94. Milla. S. (1972). Thc development of visual aad -tic judgements of Newcombe, N. (1982). Sex-rrlwd diffcrcnca in spatial ability: Problems and gap in cumnt appropches. In M. Potegal (Ed.), Spatial abilities: Developmental a d physiological fo&tionr. New Yo&. Academic Rcu. Smothergill. D.W. (1973). Accumcy and variabiility in tbc localisation of spatial tagas Y thra age levelr. Developmental Psychfogy, 8,6246. Von Hofstcn, C.. & Rosblad, B. (1988). The intcgrPtion of sensory informtion in the development of prccisc manual pointing. Neuropsyhologia 26,805-821. Research 2. 131-144. Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology, 33.61 1-678. Ethic and sex diffemce~. British JOUrnalof P~h o l o g y , 70,351-365. dim=. Britirh J o W of Prychol~gy, 63,271-282.

Sensory-motor deficits in children with developmental coordination disorder, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and autistic disorder

“…Only two studies appear to have examined kinaesthetic acuity, and they have provided contrary results. Using the KAT (Livesey & Parkes, 1995), Whitmont and Clark (1996) found significantly poorer kinaesthetic acuity and poorer fine motor control in children with ADHD compared with control children. In contrast, we found no significant differences in kinaesthetic acuity between children with either ADHD-PI or ADHD-C and control children (Piek, Pitcher & Hay, 1999).…”

“…Complex visuospatial processing was investigated using the subtests of Block Design, Object 7 Assembly and Geometric Design from the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence-Revised (WPPSI-R: Wechsler, 1989). In addition, kinaesthetic acuity was tested using the Kinaesthetic Acuity Test (KAT: Livesey & Parkes, 1995). This involves passive movement of the child's hand in the horizontal plane from the centre of a circle to one of 16 equally spaced targets (animal stickers).…”

Age differences in the relationship between visual movement imagery and performance on kinesthetic acuity tests.

“…The results from a series of studies that used the KAT (Coleman, Piek, & Livesey, 2001;Livesey & Coleman, 1998;Livesey & Intili, 1996;Livesey & Parkes, 1995) supported the view that previous measures had underestimated children's ability. Threeyear-olds were shown to be kinesthetically competent, there was significant improvement in kinesthetic acuity across the preschool years, and it was also shown that there is a significant relationship between performance on the KAT and on tests of motor ability.…”

“…There is some evidence that visual–kinesthetic sensory integration occurs by 8 years of age (Chicoine et al, 1992; Manyam & Laszlo, 1989). Investigations of early kinesthetic development (Livesey & Coleman, 1998; Livesey & Intili, 1996; Livesey & Parkes, 1995) have further indicated that such sensory integration is likely to be developing in the preschool years. Lautrey and Chartier (1991) proposed that, in parallel with the emergence of sensory integration, kinetic imagery emerges between the ages of 5 and 7 years.…”

Knee Joint Proprioceptive Acuity and Kinematic Control in Relation to Motor Competency in 13 to 14-Year-Old Adolescents

“…Testing of proprioceptive ability, however, remains di cult, as there are very few objective tools to measure proprioception. Previous studies estimated proprioception using a kinesthetic sensitivity test (KST) [35] and kinesthetic acuity test (KAT) [47] in children with [36,37] and without [35,37,48] DCD, but the accuracy of these methods have been criticized [45,49]. Joint position sense is a simpler method than measuring movement sense [11], and a variety of tools, including goniometers [41] and other customized apparatuses [7,9,11,49], have been used, however, mainly to assess proprioception of the upper extremity.…”