Action strategies of older adults walking through apertures

Hackney, Amy L.; Cinelli, Michael E.

doi:10.1016/j.gaitpost.2011.02.019

Cited by 45 publications

(43 citation statements)

References 11 publications

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“…Previous work on locomotion through horizontal openings focused primarily on static body dimensions such as participants' shoulder width (Warren and Whang 1987; Wagman and Taylor 2005; Hackney and Cinelli 2011, 2013b), sagittal dimensions (Franchak et al 2010), or stomach circumference (Franchak and Adolph 2013). However, squeezing through openings may depend more on dynamic body dimensions (Fath and Fajen 2011; Franchak et al 2012; Franchak and Adolph in press) such as how much the body can compress.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In fact, older adults are more likely than younger adults to overestimate their abilities when crossing streets by underestimating the amount of time it would take them to get safely across (Oxley et al 2005; Zivotofsky et al 2012). Moreover, older adults overestimate the amount of space needed to walk through doorways—they turn their bodies to ft through doorways that are much wider than their shoulders, whereas younger adults scale their decisions to turn more closely to shoulder width (Hackney and Cinelli 2011). Older adults may be less accurate because their perceptual-motor systems are compromised.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Ledge and wedge: younger and older adults’ perception of action possibilities

et al. 2013

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The current study investigated whether younger (college-age) and older adults (60+ years) differ in their ability to perceive safe and unsafe motor actions. Participants decided whether to walk through openings varying in width in two penalty conditions: In the doorway condition, if participants attempted to squeeze through impossibly narrow openings, the penalty for error was entrapment. In the ledge condition, if participants attempted to inch along impossibly narrow ledges, the penalty for error was falling. Results showed that across the lifespan, people consider falling to be a more severe penalty than getting stuck: Both younger and older adults made more conservative decisions when the penalty for error was falling, and older women were especially leery of falling. In both age groups, abilities and decisions were based on dynamic properties of the body, such as compressed body size in the doorway condition and balance in the ledge condition. Findings indicate that failure to perceive possibilities for action is unlikely to be the cause of the increased prevalence of falling in older adults.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Ledge and wedge: younger and older adults’ perception of action possibilities

et al. 2013

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“…Such a functional relationship was observed even when participants were tested in a virtual reality [8], when running through apertures [4], or when older adults were tested [11]. Furthermore, other gait and posture modifications when navigating through apertures, such as changes in speed [2], [12], [13], [14] or the magnitude of deviation of the body-midline from the center of the apertures [2], [15], [16], were also well proportioned to the ratio value.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 85%

“…Another line of evidence is that amplitudes of shoulder rotation are fine-tuned in response to the ratio value [1], [2], [4], [8], [9], [10], [11]. Such a functional relationship was observed even when participants were tested in a virtual reality [8], when running through apertures [4], or when older adults were tested [11].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Rule for Scaling Shoulder Rotation Angles while Walking through Apertures

2012

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BackgroundWhen an individual is trying to fit into a narrow aperture, the amplitude of shoulder rotations in the yaw dimension is well proportioned to the relative aperture width to body width (referred to as the critical ratio value). Based on this fact, it is generally considered that the central nervous system (CNS) determines the amplitudes of shoulder rotations in response to the ratio value. The present study was designed to determine whether the CNS follows another rule in which a minimal spatial margin is created at the aperture passage; this rule is beneficial particularly when spatial requirements for passage (i.e., the minimum passable width) become wider than the body with an external object.Methodology/Principal FindingsEight young participants walked through narrow apertures of three widths (ratio value = 0.9, 1.0, and 1.1) while holding one of three horizontal bars (short, 1.5 and 2.5 times the body width). The results showed that the amplitude of rotation angles became smaller for the respective ratio value as the bar increased in length. This was clearly inconsistent with the general hypothesis that predicted the same rotation angles for the same ratio value. Instead, the results were better explained with a new hypothesis which predicted that a smaller rotation angle was sufficient to produce a constant spatial margin as the bar-length increased in length.ConclusionThe results show that, at least under safe circumstances, the CNS is likely to determine the amplitudes of shoulder rotations to ensure the minimal spatial margin being created at one side of the body at the time of crossing. This was new in that the aperture width subtracted from the width of the body (plus object) was taken into account for the visuomotor control of locomotion through apertures.

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“…Testing the ability to safely walk through an aperture has helped not only to understand perceptual-motor control of adaptive locomotion for obstacle avoidance [17,25–27] but also to describe the reason that controlling adaptive locomotion is difficult for some types of participants. Older adults had more variability in their body rotations at various aperture widths [28,29]. Patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD) showed sharply decreased walking speeds in front of an aperture, which could be caused by episodes of freezing [18].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Walking through Apertures in Individuals with Stroke

et al. 2017

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ObjectiveWalking through a narrow aperture requires unique postural configurations, i.e., body rotation in the yaw dimension. Stroke individuals may have difficulty performing the body rotations due to motor paralysis on one side of their body. The present study was therefore designed to investigate how successfully such individuals walk through apertures and how they perform body rotation behavior.MethodStroke fallers (n = 10), stroke non-fallers (n = 13), and healthy controls (n = 23) participated. In the main task, participants walked for 4 m and passed through apertures of various widths (0.9–1.3 times the participant’s shoulder width). Accidental contact with the frame of an aperture and kinematic characteristics at the moment of aperture crossing were measured. Participants also performed a perceptual judgment task to measure the accuracy of their perceived aperture passability.Results and DiscussionStroke fallers made frequent contacts on their paretic side; however, the contacts were not frequent when they penetrated apertures from their paretic side. Stroke fallers and non-fallers rotated their body with multiple steps, rather than a single step, to deal with their motor paralysis. Although the minimum passable width was greater for stroke fallers, the body rotation angle was comparable among groups. This suggests that frequent contact in stroke fallers was due to insufficient body rotation. The fact that there was no significant group difference in the perceived aperture passability suggested that contact occurred mainly due to locomotor factors rather than perceptual factors. Two possible explanations (availability of vision and/or attention) were provided as to why accidental contact on the paretic side did not occur frequently when stroke fallers penetrated the apertures from their paretic side.

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Action strategies of older adults walking through apertures

Cited by 45 publications

References 11 publications

Ledge and wedge: younger and older adults’ perception of action possibilities

Ledge and wedge: younger and older adults’ perception of action possibilities

Rule for Scaling Shoulder Rotation Angles while Walking through Apertures

Walking through Apertures in Individuals with Stroke

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