Skaletski Emily C, Cardona Sailery Cortes, Travers Brittany G
Occupational Therapy Program, Department of Kinesiology, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, United States.
Waisman Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, United States.
Front Integr Neurosci. 2024 May 22;18:1334241. doi: 10.3389/fnint.2024.1334241. eCollection 2024.
Motor skill difficulties are common in autistic children and are related to daily living skills (DLS). However, it remains unclear which specific motor tasks are most likely to impact overall DLS. This study sought to fill this gap.
In 90 autistic children and adolescents (ages 6-17 years), we found that fine/manual motor tasks, like drawing or folding, demonstrated significant medium-sized relations with DLS, even after accounting for IQ and sensory features, whereas tasks in the areas of bilateral coordination, upper-limb coordination, and balance only related to DLS (small effect sizes) prior to accounting for IQ and sensory features. When looking at an overall balance score, we found that IQ significantly interacted on the relation between overall balance and DLS.
These results further demonstrate the particular importance of fine/manual motor skills for DLS in autistic youth, even when accounting for IQ and sensory features. Indeed, accounting for sensory features strengthened the relations between fine/manual motor skills and DLS. Our findings provide evidence of the impact of cognitive factors on the relation between balance and DLS, indicating that it may be that autistic individuals with lower IQs experience relations between balance and DLS that are different than their peers with higher IQs. Our findings support the benefit of considering individual motor skills rather than domain-level information when assessing ways to promote DLS in autistic youth. The results further shed light on the importance of fine motor skills, as well as the unique relationship of balance and DLS in autistic individuals with lower IQs.
运动技能困难在自闭症儿童中很常见，且与日常生活技能（DLS）相关。然而，尚不清楚哪些特定的运动任务最有可能影响整体日常生活技能。本研究旨在填补这一空白。
在90名自闭症儿童和青少年（6 - 17岁）中，我们发现精细/手部运动任务，如绘画或折叠，即使在考虑智商和感官特征后，与日常生活技能仍呈现出显著的中等程度关系，而双侧协调、上肢协调和平衡领域的任务在考虑智商和感官特征之前仅与日常生活技能有较小关联（效应量小）。在查看总体平衡分数时，我们发现智商在总体平衡与日常生活技能之间的关系上存在显著交互作用。
这些结果进一步证明了精细/手部运动技能对自闭症青少年日常生活技能的特殊重要性，即使考虑了智商和感官特征。事实上，考虑感官特征加强了精细/手部运动技能与日常生活技能之间的关系。我们的研究结果提供了认知因素对平衡与日常生活技能之间关系影响的证据，表明智商较低的自闭症个体在平衡与日常生活技能之间的关系可能与智商较高的同龄人不同。我们的研究结果支持在评估促进自闭症青少年日常生活技能的方法时，考虑个体运动技能而非领域层面信息的益处。结果进一步揭示了精细运动技能的重要性，以及智商较低的自闭症个体中平衡与日常生活技能的独特关系。
