Correlation of Motor Abilities and Executive Functions in Children With ADHD

Association between motor skills and executive function of children with autism spectrum disorder in Taiwan and the United States

Objective

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between parent ratings of motor skills and executive function (EF) in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) in the United States and Taiwan.

Materials and method

One hundred and seventy-two parents/legal guardians of children (4-6 years and 11 months old) with ASD were recruited from two countries, Taiwan (n = 100) and the United States (n = 72). The parents or guardians of the child with ASD completed a questionnaire including demographic information, child's motor skills (using Children Activity Scale - Parents, ChAS-P), and child's EF (using Childhood Executive Functioning Inventory, CHEXI). A series of hierarchical multiple regressions were conducted to determine whether ChAS-P (total motor score, fine motor skills, and gross motor skill) was associated with CHEXI (total EF score, working memory, and inhibition), after controlling for covariates (i.e., age, gender, race, body mass index, whether children received physical activity or cognitive training, parental education level).

Results

Total motor skills, fine motor skills, and gross motor skills were significantly associated with EF in both working memory and inhibition as rated by parents in both countries (β = 0.21-0.57, p < 0.01), with the exception of a non-significant association between parent-rated total motor skills, fine motor skills, and gross motor skills, and inhibition among Taiwanese children with ASD. In addition, the associations between parent ratings of motor skills (i.e., fine motor and gross motor skills) and EF (i.e., working memory and inhibition) were similar between the two countries.

Conclusion

Positive associations with specific aspects of parent ratings of fine motor and gross motor skills and working memory and inhibition were found in children with ASD from both countries. These findings have implications for future interventions and programs focused on improving early motor skills and EF development for young children with ASD from Taiwan and the United States.

Relationship between motor abilities and executive functions in patients after pediatric stroke

Patients after pediatric stroke typically experience varying extent of motor and cognitive impairments. During rehabilitation, these impairments are often treated as separate entities. While there is a notion claiming that motor and cognitive functions are interrelated to some degree in healthy children, a minimal amount of evidence exists regarding this issue in patients after pediatric stroke. The purpose of this study was to investigate the association between motor abilities and executive functions in patients after pediatric arterial ischemic stroke. Twenty-seven patients (6 - 23 years) diagnosed with pediatric arterial ischemic stroke in the chronic phase (≥ 2 years after diagnosis, diagnosed < 16 years) and 49 healthy controls (6 - 26 years) were included in this study. Participants completed six tasks from standardized neuropsychological tests assessing the dimensions of executive functions, namely working memory, inhibition, and shifting. Additionally, we assessed hand strength and upper limb performance with two tasks each. In the patient group, the association between upper limb performance and executive functions was stronger than between hand strength and executive functions. Our results point toward the idea of a close interrelation between upper limb performance and executive functions. Training more complex and cognitively engaging motor abilities involving upper limb performance rather than basic motor abilities such as hand strength during a rehabilitation program may have the power to foster executive function development and vice versa in patients after stroke.

Motor dysfunction as research domain across bipolar, obsessive-compulsive and neurodevelopmental disorders

Although genuine motor abnormalities (GMA) are frequently found in schizophrenia, they are also considered as an intrinsic feature of bipolar, obsessive-compulsive, and neurodevelopmental disorders with early onset such as autism, ADHD, and Tourette syndrome. Such transnosological observations strongly suggest a common neural pathophysiology. This systematic review highlights the evidence on GMA and their neuroanatomical substrates in bipolar, obsessive-compulsive, and neurodevelopmental disorders. The data lends support for a common pattern contributing to GMA expression in these diseases that seems to be related to cerebello-thalamo-cortical, fronto-parietal, and cortico-subcortical motor circuit dysfunction. The identified studies provide first evidence for a motor network dysfunction as a correlate of early neurodevelopmental deviance prior to clinical symptom expression. There are also first hints for a developmental risk factor model of these mental disorders. An in-depth analysis of motor networks and related patho-(physiological) mechanisms will not only help promoting Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) Motor System construct, but also facilitate the development of novel psychopharmacological models, as well as the identification of neurobiologically plausible target sites for non-invasive brain stimulation.

Cognitive predictors of sequential motor impairments in children with dyslexia and/or attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder

This study examined cognitive predictors of sequential motor skills in 215 children with dyslexia and/or attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Visual working memory and math fluency abilities contributed significantly to performance of sequential motor abilities in children with dyslexia (N = 67), ADHD (N = 66) and those with a comorbid diagnosis (N = 82), generally without differentiation between groups. In addition, primary diagnostic features of each disorder, such as reading and inattention, did not contribute to the variance in motor skill performance of these children. The results support a unifying framework of motor impairment in children with neurodevelopmental disorders such as dyslexia and ADHD.

Executive functioning of Portuguese preschoolers in the Shape School test: A cross cultural study

The Shape School is a neuropsychological test of executive functions (EF) for preschool-aged children. The purposes of this study were: (a) to adapt the use of the Shape School for European Portuguese preschool children and (b) to examine the cultural sensitivity of this test comparing the performance of Portuguese sample and U.S. normative sample. The executive functioning of 233 typically developing children aged 3 to 5 years old (M = 57.52; SD = 10.25; in months) was analyzed and according to our results, the adapted version was appropriate to obtain the discrimination among age-groups. Portuguese and American preschoolers show similar EF profiles. It was possible, in both samples, to note the sensitivity of the measurement to age-related differences, with the older age groups outperforming the younger. Therefore, the Portuguese version of the Shape School was considered suitable for research and clinical purposes.

Relationship of cognitive functions and gross motor abilities in children with spastic diplegic cerebral palsy

Spastic diplegic cerebral palsy can be accompanied by a myriad of symptoms affecting other body systems including cognitive dysfunction. The purpose of this study was to determine whether a relationship exists between cognitive functions in the form of selective attention and figural memory domains with standing and walking motor abilities in children with diplegic cerebral palsy. The research design was a correlational study. Tasks assessing cognitive function and gross motor abilities were carried out with a sample of 50 children. The data demonstrated the presence of correlation between selective attention and figural memory domains of cognitive function with standing, walking running, and jumping subscales of the Gross Motor Function Measure (GMFM) scale at different ages, and this correlation was significant between selective attention domain and gross motor abilities. The outcome measurements of the current study provide original evidence based on the necessity of including cognitive and physical impairments in the examination and evaluation of children with diplegic cerebral palsy in research and clinical settings.