Koren Yogev, Mairon Rotem, Sofer Ilay, Parmet Yisrael, Ben-Shahar Ohad, Bar-Haim Simona
Physical Therapy Department, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
Computer Science Department, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel.
R Soc Open Sci. 2021 Mar 17;8(3):201556. doi: 10.1098/rsos.201556.
When walking on an uneven surface or complex terrain, humans tend to gaze downward. This behaviour is usually interpreted as an attempt to acquire useful information to guide locomotion. Visual information, however, is not used exclusively for guiding locomotion; it is also useful for postural control. Both locomotive and postural control have been shown to be sensitive to the visual flow arising from the respective motion of the individual and the three-dimensional environment. This flow changes when a person gazes downward and may present information that is more appropriate for postural control. To investigate whether downward gazing can be used for postural control, rather than exclusively for guiding locomotion, we quantified the dynamics of standing and walking posture in healthy adults, under several visual conditions. Through these experiments we were able to demonstrate that gazing downward, just a few steps ahead, resulted in a steadier standing and walking posture. These experiments indicate that gazing downward may serve more than one purpose and provide sufficient evidence of the possible interplay between the visual information used for guiding locomotion and that used for postural control. These findings contribute to our understanding of the control mechanism/s underlying gait and posture and have possible clinical implications.
在不平整的表面或复杂地形上行走时，人类往往会向下看。这种行为通常被解释为试图获取有用信息以指导运动。然而，视觉信息并非仅用于指导运动；它对姿势控制也很有用。已表明运动控制和姿势控制都对个体与三维环境各自运动所产生的视觉流敏感。当一个人向下看时，这种视觉流会发生变化，并且可能呈现出更适合姿势控制的信息。为了研究向下注视是否可用于姿势控制，而不仅仅是用于指导运动，我们在几种视觉条件下对健康成年人站立和行走姿势的动态变化进行了量化。通过这些实验，我们能够证明向前方几步远的地方向下看会使站立和行走姿势更稳定。这些实验表明向下注视可能有不止一个目的，并为用于指导运动的视觉信息与用于姿势控制的视觉信息之间可能存在的相互作用提供了充分证据。这些发现有助于我们理解步态和姿势背后的控制机制，并且具有可能的临床意义。
