Development of manipulative hand movements during the second year of life (original) (raw)
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Longitudinal study of unimanual actions and grasping forces during infancy
Infant Behavior and Development, 2012
Learning to grasp an object is an important milestone in neurological development during infancy. Several studies report development of reaching in infants but less attention is devoted to reaching with successful grasping and to development of grip force. This study investigates, in the first weeks of life, the development of palmar grasp both for assessment of unimanual/bimanual grasping actions in centrally and laterally placed objects and for measurement of exerted power grip force. We longitudinally examined ten infants from 18 weeks to 41 weeks, at 2-weeks intervals, with a toy placed in three positions (body midline, ipsilateral and contralateral shoulder). Our main aim was to study this development through an ecological approach. This was possible thanks to the use of the "biomechatronic gym", a new platform purposively developed for measuring reaching and grasping forces. These longitudinal trials showed a good level of acceptance and involvement by infants of the entire system. The results demonstrated a significant increase in unimanual power grip force between the 18th and 30th week followed by a flat period until the 41st week; we also ascertained an early tendency to play bimanually with centrally and laterally placed objects with a subsequent increase in all ages of unimanual successful power grasping both for central task and midline crossing. These developmental changes may be, in part, related to organism constraints such as maturation of the corticospinal tract.
Stability of Individual Differences in Infants' Manipulation and Exploration of Objects
Perceptual and Motor Skills, 1987
The purpose of this study was to assess stability of manipulative behavior across time. 29 infants were seen at both 9 and 9.5 mo.; 20 of these infants were seen again at 12 mo. At each visit the infants were presented several objects for familiarization and tested for response to discrepant objects. Each trial was scored for the duration of looking, rotating the object, fingering, mouthing, and banging, the frequency of transferring the object from hand to hand, and the frequency of dropping, throwing and pushing the object away. Analysis of the data yielded moderate to high correlations between 9 and 9.5 mo. for all but one behavior. Correlations between 9 and 12 mo. were in the same range for most of the behaviors. On the test trials, there were fewer significant correlations. When the behaviors were separated into exploratory and nonexploratory categories, there was more stability for the nonexploratory behaviors; summary scores for both were concurrently related to Bayley Menta...
Relation between hand function and gross motor function in full term infants aged 4 to 8 months
Brazilian journal of physical therapy
In children, reaching emerges around four months of age, which is followed by rapid changes in hand function and concomitant changes in gross motor function, including the acquisition of independent sitting. Although there is a close functional relationship between these domains, to date they have been investigated separately. To investigate the longitudinal profile of changes and the relationship between the development of hand function (i.e. reaching for and manipulating an object) and gross motor function in 13 normally developing children born at term who were evaluated every 15 days from 4 to 8 months of age. The number of reaches and the period (i.e. time) of manipulation to an object were extracted from video synchronized with the Qualisys(r) movement analysis system. Gross motor function was measured using the Alberta Infant Motor Scale. ANOVA for repeated measures was used to test the effect of age on the number of reaches, the time of manipulation and gross motor function....
Development of manual dexterity in preschool children
Human Movement, 2018
Purpose. the aim of the study is to identify the changes in manual dexterity that occur in preschool children. Methods. the sample consisted of 79 healthy preschool children from Wroclaw, Poland. Manual dexterity was assessed twice: at the beginning of the school year and 9 months later at the end. the mean age of the group was 5.98 ± 0.45 years (initial assessment) and 6.86 ± 0.35 years (final assessment). Motor performance was evaluated with the Motorische Leistungsserie (MLS) test. Statistical analysis was carried out with ANOVA, and the percentage change of each parameter was calculated for the 9-month study period. Differences were considered significant at p < 0.05. Results. there was a 45% improvement in steadiness, which shows that the children were more able to hold their hands in a given position without shaking for a prolonged time. the children made significant progress in grasping and carrying small objects with fingers and placing them in sequential openings on the work surface of the test apparatus in a vertical line, performing better than adults in this regard. the results for the aiming subtest improved by over 20% in the children examined. the rate of tapping increased by almost 8%. Improvements in line tracing, however, were limited to the accuracy of performing the subtest. Conclusions. the results of the study reveal the need for longitudinal studies on this topic. Selected parameters of manual dexterity in preschool children improved from 4% to 45% over the course of the 9-month school year.
From the reaching behavior at 5 months of age to hand preference at preschool age
Developmental Psychobiology, 2008
The aim of the study was to examine the reaching behavior at the age of 5 months, and to determine whether and to what extent there is a relationship between hand use at this age and manual laterality at preschool age. 20 participants (13 girls and 7 boys) were investigated on two occasions: At the age of 5 months we assessed the hand use for reaching for four different objects placed at the infant's body midline or in their right or left hemispaces, respectively. At the age of 5 years and 7 months, we assessed the hand use for 22 motor tasks. The handedness status was calculated in order to reflect the sinistrality-dextrality continuum. All but one infant were unimanual reachers at 5 months of age. Preferential reaching was space dependent rather than object dependent at this stage. Children reaching for objects in the right hemispace predominantly with their right hand showed a significantly greater right hand laterality at late preschool age than children who at the age of 5 months had shown inconsistent hand use (p < .05). Children who at the age of 5 months had reached for objects in the left hemispace with their left hand proved to be less lateralized in their right hand use approximately 5 years later (p < .05). ß 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Dev Psychobiol 50: 511-518, 2008.
Acta clinica Croatica, 2013
The early child development, from birth until the age of one year is, amongst other changes, characterized by intense motor learning. During that period, the voluntary learning patterns evolve from reflexive patterns to coordinated voluntary patterns. All of the child's voluntary movements present active forms in which the child communicates with the environment. In this communication, the hand plays an important role. Its brain representation covers one-third of the entire motor region, situated in the close proximity to the speech region. For this reason, some authors refer to hand as a "speech organ". According to numerous studies, each separate finger also has a relatively large representation in the cerebral cortex, which points to the importance of the fine motor skills development, or precise, highly differentiated movements of hand muscles following the principles of differentiation and hierarchical integration. Development of the fine motor skills in the hand ...
Frontiers in psychology, 2018
The kinematics of hand movements (spatial use, curvature, acceleration, and velocity) of infants with their mothers in an interactive setting are significantly associated with age in cohorts of typical and at-risk infantsdiffer significantly at 5-6 months of age, depending on the context: relating either with an object or a person.Environmental and developmental factors shape the developmental trajectories of hand movements in different cohorts: environment for infants with VIMs; stage of development for premature infants and those with West syndrome; and both factors for infants with orality disorders.The curvature of hand movements specifically reflects atypical development in infants with West syndrome when developmental age is considered. We aimed to discriminate between typical and atypical developmental trajectory patterns of at-risk infants in an interactive setting in this observational and longitudinal study, with the assumption that hand movements (HM) reflect preverbal co...
Infant Behavior and Development, 2009
The goal of this study was to investigate some of the visuo-motor factors underlying an infant's developing ability to grasp a laterally-moving object. In particular, hand preference, midline crossing, and visual-field asymmetry were investigated by comparing performance as a function of the object's direction of motion. We presented 6-, 8-, and 10-month-old infants with a graspable object, moving in a circular trajectory in the horizontal plane. Sixmonth-old infants reached for the object with the ipsilateral hand and grasped it with the contralateral hand. Eight-month-old infants showed a strong right-hand bias for both reaching and grasping. Ten-month-old infants showed a greater diversity of strategy use including bimanual and successful ipsilateral grasping following ipsilateral reaching in both directions of motion. Thus, motor constraints due to spatial compatibility, hand preference and bimanual coordination (but not midline crossing) must be taken into account to understand age differences in grasping a moving object.
Toy-oriented changes during early arm movements: Hand kinematics
Infant Behavior and Development, 2006
In a recent cross-sectional study, we found that young infants changed their spontaneous arm movements in the presence of a toy, termed 'toy-oriented changes', in systematic ways beginning many weeks before their first consistent reaches [Bhat, A. N., Heathcock, J. H., & Galloway, J. C. (2005). Toy-oriented changes in hand and joint kinematics during the emergence of purposeful reaching. Infant Behavior and Development, 28(4), 445-465]. The purpose of the present study was to test specific hypotheses regarding toy-oriented changes in a longitudinal design. Methods: Thirteen infants were observed every other week from 8 weeks of age up to the onset of reaching. At each session, hand and joint motions were observed with and without a toy present using a high-speed motion capture system. This paper focuses on the toy-oriented changes in hand variables. Results: As predicted, infants displayed a meaningful pattern of toy-oriented changes, which systematically changed as infants approached the first week of reaching. During the Early phase (8-10 weeks before reaching), infants scaled down their movement length and speed in the presence of a toy. During the Mid phase (4-6 weeks before reaching), infants scaled up movement number and speed, increased movement smoothness, and decreased their hand-toy distance in the presence of a toy. During the Late phase (within 2 weeks of reaching), infants continued to change their hand's position to get closer to the toy and began contacting it. Interestingly, movement number and smoothness displayed similar developmental patterns, where movement length and speed displayed similar patterns. Conclusion: Toy-oriented adaptation of arm movements emerges in the first months of life and forms a complex, yet tractable continuum with purposeful reaching. These results provide a foundation to test more specific hypotheses of hand and joint coordination in both typically developing infants and those infants born at risk for coordination impairments.