The use of self-motion feedback for balance control in younger and older dancers

Leigh H Schanfein, Purdue University

Abstract

Balance screening and training systems have emerged in clinical and research settings as tools to assess and alter postural control. They provide visual feedback about postural sway with the use of a forceplate/computer interface, which can be used by the subject to correct postural placement, much like a dancer corrects him/herself when using a mirror. It is possible that dance training with a mirror enhances use of visual information in conjunction with proprioceptive and vestibular information specifically for balance control. The Bertec BalanceCheck Screener and Trainer was used to examine visual feedback training. Since this product recommends that subjects adopt a preferred stance width, a preliminary experiment examined if stance width affected balance measures. A second experiment examined how dancers and non-dancers responded to such a system. For the stance width experiment, 15 subjects (24 ± 3.3 yrs) performed a quiet standing protocol and a balance training protocol on the BalanceCheck system for four different stance widths. For the dancer experiment, 13 younger dancers (21 ± 2.3 yrs), 7 older dancers (51 ± 4.9 yrs), 10 younger non-dancers (21 ± 2.0 yrs), and 9 older non-dancers (53 ± 4.3 yrs) performed a quiet standing protocol and a balance training protocol on the system once per week, for nine weeks. The quiet standing protocol required subjects to stand quietly with the eyes open or closed, while standing on a rigid or foam surface. The training protocol required the subjects to manipulate postural sway according to a cursor seen on a computer screen, while standing on a rigid or foam surface. A younger control group of 9 subjects (22 ± 3.1 yrs) was also included; the group received sham training instead of visual feedback training. Results of the stance width study indicate that the subjects’ preferred stance width did not affect balance measures; only narrow stance width was different from the other stance widths. In the dancer study, results indicate that the visual feedback training protocol had no effect on quiet standing task performance. Younger non-dancers and controls were the only groups to find perturbed proprioception a greater challenge to balance than removal of visual feedback, while younger dancers and older non-dancers appeared to be more reliant on vision than proprioception for balance. Though all groups demonstrated improved scores over time for training task performance, younger dancers demonstrated greater spatial and temporal scores when performing dynamic training tasks.

Degree

M.S.

Advisors

Rietdyk, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Dance|Physical therapy|Cognitive psychology

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