Critchley Kazumi, Kokubu Masahiro, Iemitsu Motoyuki, Fujita Satoshi, Isaka Tadao
Graduate School of Sport and Health Science, Ritsumeikan University, Kusatsu, Shiga, Japan.
Eur J Appl Physiol. 2014 Sep;114(9):1925-32. doi: 10.1007/s00421-014-2916-8. Epub 2014 Jun 8.
Previous research has indicated that older adults have significantly lower accuracy in terms of force control than young adults. In addition, accuracy of force control is known to decrease in the absence of visual feedback. However, whether the effect of visual feedback on fine motor control is similar for young adults and older adults is not clear. The purpose of this study, therefore, was to examine the effect of visual feedback on bimanual pinch force control in older adults.
Thirty-one undergraduate students (age 19.7 ± 0.9 years) and 31 older adults (age 65.1 ± 8.1 years) participated in this study. After measuring finger-pinch maximal voluntary force (MVF), the participants were asked to maintain 10% MVF as steadily as possible in two different conditions: with visual feedback (visual feedback condition; VF condition) and without visual feedback (no visual feedback condition; NVF condition).
We found that older adults had significantly greater targeting error and force variability than young adults in the VF condition, but not in the NVF condition. In addition, older participants exhibited a significantly greater sum of power for the 0-4 and 4-8 Hz frequency bin than young adults (p < 0.05) in the VF condition, although there was no significant difference in the NVF condition.
These results suggest that older adults do not use visual information as effectively as younger adults to reduce force control error.
先前的研究表明，老年人在力量控制方面的准确性明显低于年轻人。此外，已知在没有视觉反馈的情况下，力量控制的准确性会下降。然而，视觉反馈对年轻人和老年人精细运动控制的影响是否相似尚不清楚。因此，本研究的目的是探讨视觉反馈对老年人双手捏力控制的影响。
31名本科生（年龄19.7±0.9岁）和31名老年人（年龄65.1±8.1岁）参与了本研究。在测量手指捏力最大自主收缩力（MVF）后，要求参与者在两种不同条件下尽可能稳定地保持10%MVF：有视觉反馈（视觉反馈条件；VF条件）和无视觉反馈（无视觉反馈条件；NVF条件）。
我们发现，在VF条件下，老年人的目标误差和力量变异性显著大于年轻人，但在NVF条件下并非如此。此外，在VF条件下，老年参与者在0-4和4-8Hz频段的功率总和显著大于年轻参与者（p<0.05），尽管在NVF条件下没有显著差异。
这些结果表明，老年人在利用视觉信息减少力量控制误差方面不如年轻人有效。
