An Indiana University proposes an
innovative treatment for developmental coordination disorder, a potentially
debilitating neurological disorder in which the development of a child's fine
or gross motor skills, or both, is impaired. DCD strikes about one in 20
children, predominantly boys, and frequently occurs alongside ADHD, autism
spectrum disorders and other better known conditions. Like ADHD, DCD has broad
academic, social and emotional impact. It can severely affect reading, spelling
and handwriting abilities; and insofar as children with DCD both struggle with
and avoid physical activity, it can also lead to problems with self-esteem,
obesity and injury. Severity of the disorder varies, and as the researchers
explain, it is sometimes called the ‘hidden disorder’ because of the way those
with milder cases develop coping strategies that conceal the disorder, such as
using computers to avoid handwriting tasks, and wearing shirts without buttons,
or shoes without laces. But children with DCD have been generally thought
unable to learn or improve their motor skills. After training the children over
a five- to six-week period, one day a week for 20 minutes at a time, the
differences between children with DCD and typically developing children were
all but obliterated. Key to the training
was a unique technology: a three-dimensional virtual reality device, the
PHANTOM Omni from Sensable Technologies, developed for the visualization of
knots by topologists, who study geometric forms in space. Holding a stylus
attached to a robot, participants in the study developed their fine motor
skills by playing a game in which they traced a three-dimensional virtual path
in the air, visually represented on a computer screen.
Forces such as magnetic
attraction and friction can be applied to the path and adjusted so participants
could actually feel a surface that changed as the parameters were altered. The
study compared the progress of a group of eight 7- to 8-year-olds with DCD to a
group of eight 7- to 8-year-old typically developing children in a
three-dimensional tracing game. The task was to push a brightly colored fish
along a visible path on a computer screen from the starting location to the
finish point while racing a competitor fish. The training started with the
highest level of magnetic attraction, slowest competitor and shortest path. The
goal of the training was to allow the children to progress at their own pace
through the different combinations and levels of attraction, paths and
competitors. Children must first be able to approximate a movement by actively
generating it themselves before they can improve it through practice and
repetition. But because children with DCD have been unable to produce this
initial movement, they have been unable to improve their skills. The technology
provided the tool needed to overcome this impasse. It gave both the support
needed to produce the movement, as well as the flexibility to let children
actively generate the movement themselves. It allowed the children to do what
they otherwise could not do: produce the requisite initial movements that could
then be practiced to yield quantitative improvements. Researchers say the
technology could potentially be widely accessible: It can be used without a
therapist and is portable enough to be put in clinics, classrooms or the home.
It can also be adjusted to suit the needs of children across the spectrum of
DCD severity.
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