Is Postural Control Different in Boys and Girls? Comparison Between Sex

The effect of educational gymnastics on postural control of young children

Fundamental movement skill (FMS) proficiency does not develop solely due to maturation, but also via diverse perceptual-motor experiences across childhood. Practicing gymnastics has been shown to improve postural control. The purpose of the present study was to examine potential changes to postural control of children following a course of educational gymnastics. Two groups of children both completed 20 × 45-min physical education (PE) lessons; one group (n = 43, age = 6.4 ± 0.7, 56% male) completed educational gymnastics lessons in school delivered by a professional coach, the other group completed their typical PE classes (n = 18, age = 6.5 ± 0.3, 33% male). Unipedal balancing performance was assessed by calculating the percentage of successful trials made. Postural sway dynamics were explored by calculating center-of-pressure sample entropy, 95% ellipse sway area and sway velocity. Measurements were taken before the lessons began and immediately after the lessons were completed. The gymnastics group performed better than the typical PE group at unipedal balancing. Females outperformed males in both groups. Males made different changes to postural control (i.e., increased sway regularity and improved stability) compared to females across 3 months. Educational gymnastics enabled children in a critical period of development to make more rapid improvements to postural performance and control. Novel movement experiences, like those offered by educational gymnastics, may have a positive influence on postural control and importantly, physical literacy. Future work should examine how sex effects the development of postural control strategies in young children.

Age-Related, Sport-Specific Dysfunctions of the Shoulder and Pelvic Girdle in Athletes Table Tennis Players. Observational Study

Background: Postural skills are fundamental in motor activities, so far no evidence of a direct relationship has been found, it is therefore recommended to consider the following directions, the higher the level of sports competition, the better the body posture; or better athletes also have a better body posture. Around the age of 11-14 years, it is a period of aggressive development, if the rapid growth of the bone system is not associated and symmetrical with the development of soft tissues serious postural deficiencies may develop in table tennis players. Methods: We used the web camera – photographic method (38) related to the Sensor Medica software that allows the acquisition of images in order to detect postural deficiencies and we considered it necessary to have a clear image of the level of technical-tactical training of female juniors III using 5 tests specific to topspin attack in order to assess the influence of body posture on such tests. Eighteen female juniors III (the mean ± SD age, height and weight were 11.1 ± 0.2 years, 147.7 ± 2.6 cm, 39.0 ± 2.0 kg). Descriptive statistical analysis was performed on the procedures for establishing the normality of data distribution, Levene's Test for Equality of Variances, the t test for independent samples. The confidence interval was set at 95% (p < 0.05), Results and Conclusions: Since Sig. (2-tailed) or p < α = 0.001 and taking into account that the confidence interval limits for the difference between the sample mean and the reference value (95% CI for the mean difference) do not contain the zero value, it is accepted that there are statistically significant differences between the shoulder inclination for the female athletes in the sample studied and the reference value. We identified that at the level of alignment between anatomical landmarks, the percentage of deficiency of the entire lot of female juniors III in the case of shoulders is 100% and at the level of PSIS is 66%, which validates several studies that stated that in this period of aggressive growth correlated with repetitive unilateral executions specific to the topspin attack lead to postural deficiencies. In terms of the influence of body posture on the quality level, we identified that Group 1 – (without PSIS imbalance) has a higher average overall efficiency of the 5 tests (11.33) compared to Group 2 (8.58), even if from a statistical point of view these differences are not significant. Keywords: Body posture, Asimmetry, Topspin attack, Table tennis, Sensor Medica,