Eva Michel

Development of Cognitive Skills in Children with Motor Coordination Impairments at 12-Month Follow-up

The current study presents a 1-year follow-up investigation of the development of executive functions (i.e., inhibition, updating, and shifting) in children with motor coordination impairments. Cognitive and motor coordination skills of children (N = 94) aged between 5 and 7 years with and without motor coordination impairments were compared. A second focus of the study was on pre-academic skills. The results indicate marked stability of motor coordination impairments and persistent executive functioning deficits in motor-impaired children. Inhibition and shifting performance was consistently lower, compared to the children without motor coordination impairments. Moreover, children with motor coordination impairments showed lower pre-academic skills, facing a substantial disadvantage at the beginning of formal schooling. The combined cognitive and motor problems may be the result of an underlying inhibition deficit or a general automation deficit. Implications for intervention are discussed.

School enrolment and executive functioning: A longitudinal perspective on developmental changes, the influence of learning context, and the prediction of pre-academic skills

The present two-year longitudinal study addressed developmental changes in different aspects of executive functioning (i.e., inhibition, updating, and cognitive flexibility) in a sample of 264 children aged between 5 and 7 years. Of special interest were issues of developmental progression over time, the influence of learning context and the predictive power of executive functions and school context for emerging academic skills. The results revealed pronounced improvements in all executive measures, both over time and as a function of age. For the learning context, small and age-dependent effects on executive skills were found. Inhibition uniquely contributed to the prediction of aspects of emerging academic skills, over and above chronological age and language skills.

Children in Regular and Special Needs Classes: Cognitive and Non-Cognitive Aspects

In the present study, systematic comparisons between Swiss children attending regular first grade classes and those enrolled in classes for children with special needs (so-called “Einfuhrungsklassen”, in which the first grade curriculum is spread over two years) are reported. Different aspects of executive skills in the domain of short-term memory, attention, motor coordination, and achievement motivation are addressed. For most cognitive measures, children in special needs classes perform more poorly than children in regular classes. Deficits appeared to be pronounced in tasks of high complexity and with multiple demands, but there were no differences with respect to self-concept and school motivation. Follow-up analyses indicate that improvement in most of the tasks was minimal and that children in special needs classes do not catch up to their age-mates. The findings are discussed in terms of adequate placement of these children and the need for early and efficient prevention/intervention programs.

Differential changes in the development of motor coordination and executive functions in children with motor coordination impairments

ABSTRACT Cognitive and motor coordination skills of children with and without motor coordination impairments were examined with a one-year follow-up investigation. Initially, children were between 4 and 6 years old. Age-appropriate tests of executive functions (updating, switching, inhibition, interference control), motor coordination (the Movement Assessment Battery for Children-2) and fitness (the Körperkoordinations-Test für Kinder) were administered in two consecutive years. Several background variables (age, socioeconomic status, medical support, clinical interventions, leisure activities) and potential moderators (nonverbal intelligence, reaction time, visual perception) were controlled. The matched sample consisted of 48 control children and 48 children with motor coordination impairments. The children’s executive functions dramatically improved during the one-year period. With regard to motor coordination performance, half of the impaired children caught up to the control children’s level (“remission group”), while the remaining half showed no improvement (“persisting group”). Compared to the persisting group, the children in the remission group showed markedly better interference control at both measurement points. The correlation between executive functions and motor coordination is significant in the persisting group, but not in the remission group. The results of the study are discussed in the light of the role of executive functions, especially inhibition processes, for the automatization of motor coordination tasks.

Motor coordination and executive functions

Since Piaget, the view that motor and cognitive development are interrelated has gained wide acceptance. However, empirical research on this issue is still rare. Few studies show a correlation of performance in cognitive and motor tasks in typically developing children. More specifically, Diamond hypothesizes an involvement of executive functions in motor coordination tasks. The study of Rigoli et al. focuses on this relationship. Beyond this, it also provides new insights by exploring the predictive power of motor coordination skills for executive functions in a normative adolescent sample. Their results contribute important information about specific associations between components of motor coordination (manual dexterity, ball skills, and balance) and executive functions (working memory, inhibition, and switching). A strength of the study is that attention-deficit–hyperactivity disorder symptoms and verbal intelligence were controlled. Notably, all three executive function components (working memory, timing measures of inhibition, and switching) correlate substantially with motor coordination. This might indicate shared control processes involved in mastering the cognitive and motor tasks. Of particular interest is the specific association between motor coordination performance and the timing measure (but not the accuracy measure) of the response inhibition task. This supports earlier findings and might hint at an involvement of automatization processes linked to cerebellar function. Individuals with lower motor coordination performance might have difficulties with the speed–accuracy trade-off in complex tasks. The Rigoli et al. study provides new and important information in the domain of motor coordination and executive functions, but much still needs to be done. Starting with the authors¢ hypothesis that motor performance predicts executive functioning, a different approach would be to expect executive functioning to predict motor performance, because executive functions are thought to be cognitive processes responsible for cognitive and motor control. One possibility would be to test these hypotheses against each other. From a clinical perspective, examining the cognitive profiles of children with developmental coordination disorder (or children who are at risk for developmental coordination disorder) may shed additional light on the role of executive functions for the acquisition and automation of new skills. Some researchers have argued that deficits in the acquisition and automatization of new motor skills may arise from a developmental delay in executive functions. Children with and at risk for developmental coordination disorder were found to show inferior performance in the domain of working memory, and in attentional and inhibitory skills; also in tasks that have high demands on planning, monitoring, call for continuous adaptation or sequencing, and ⁄or have to be performed under speed or speed and accuracy instructions. This would lead to important consequences for intervention: apart from focusing on motor coordination skills, an intervention should include cognitive training of executive skills. Further, longitudinal research is needed to examine the developmental course of executive functions and motor coordination in children with and without motor impairments. Longitudinal studies with sufficient large sample sizes would allow the application of structural equation models and thus the possibility to analyze causal relations. Additionally, research on executive functions and motor coordination should include younger groups and ⁄or broader age bands. The reason for this is that executive functions show a protracted development from infancy into adolescence, while complex executive skills show marked growth between 5 years and 8 years of age. Finally, it would be interesting to examine additional aspects of motor performance, for example strength, speed, and ⁄or aerobic capacity. Physical fitness is strongly correlated with motor coordination and therefore may influence the relationship between executive functions and motor coordination.

The Role of Individual Differences in Cognitive Skills in Children’s Learning Through Film

This study examines the role of individual differences in cognitive skills in children’s learning through educational films. A total of 40 children, half of them aged 6, the other half 8, were shown a film about sugar production. After one week, the children took part in a memory test on the film’s content with free recall, cued recall, and recognition. In a second session, four working memory and attention tasks were administered. Results reveal that individual differences in domain-specific working memory skills account for substantial variance in the learning outcome, whereas children’s age was no significant predictor. Findings are discussed in terms of cognitive processes underlying learning through films.

Aufmerksamkeitsprozesse bei Kindern mit motorischen Auffälligkeiten. Zur Rolle der Leistungsvariabilität

Motorisch auffallige Kinder losen Aufmerksamkeitsaufgaben oft langsamer und ungenauer als motorisch unauffallige Kinder. In dieser Studie wurde untersucht, ob die Reaktionen auch variabler sind, was Aufschluss uber die Art der Aufmerksamkeitskontrollprobleme geben konnte. Motorisch auffallige (n = 25) und unauffallige Kinder (n = 70) wurden untersucht. Auffallige Kinder zeigten langsamere, ungenauere und variablere Reaktionszeiten. Schulleistungen wurden durch Reaktionszeiten und Reaktionszeitvariabilitaten (RTVs) beeinflusst. Diskutiert werden mogliche Defizite in der Aufmerksamkeitskontrolle, die fur Schulleistungsprobleme bei motorisch auffalligen Kindern mitverantwortlich sein konnten.