Determinants of gross motor skill performance in children with visual impairments.
Totally blind kids show steep gross-motor deficits—start explicit motor goals now, not later.
01Research in Context
What this study did
The team gave the TGMD-II gross-motor test to children with visual impairments.
They split the kids into two groups: totally blind and partially sighted.
The goal was to see how much vision loss, age, or sex shaped motor scores.
What they found
Totally blind children scored far below their partially sighted peers.
How much vision was lost mattered most; age and sex barely moved the needle.
The gap was large enough to flag a need for early, explicit motor teaching.
How this fits with other research
Engel-Yeger et al. (2013) extends the story: the same kids later join fewer after-school activities, showing that poor motor skills shrink real-world participation.
Lanza et al. (2024) pulls the 2014 TGMD-II data into a big 2024 scoping review. Their synthesis confirms that vision severity, not age, drives both motor and quality-of-life deficits.
Reus et al. (2013) looks methodologically similar: they adapted the Bayley-III for toddlers with visual or motor impairments and also found that standard tools underestimate ability unless you tweak them.
Why it matters
If a child is totally blind, do not wait for them to "catch up" naturally. Screen with TGMD-II early, then write goals for balance, run, and jump just as you would for communication or daily living. Pair the goals with community outings so the new skills transfer to playgrounds and PE class.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Children with visual impairments (CWVI) generally perform poorer in gross motor skills when compared with their sighted peers. This study examined the influence of age, sex, and severity of visual impairment upon locomotor and object control skills in CWVI. Participants included 100 CWVI from across the United States who completed the Test of Gross Motor Development II (TGMD-II). The TGMD-II consists of 12 gross motor skills including 6 object control skills (catching, kicking, striking, dribbling, throwing, and rolling) and 6 locomotor skills (running, sliding, galloping, leaping, jumping, and hopping). The full range of visual impairments according to United States Association for Blind Athletes (USABA; B3=20/200-20/599, legally blind; B2=20/600 and up, travel vision; B1=totally blind) were assessed. The B1 group performed significantly worse than the B2 (0.000 ≤ p ≤ 0.049) or B3 groups (0.000 ≤ p ≤ 0.005); however, there were no significant differences between B2 and B3 except for the run (p=0.006), catch (p=0.000), and throw (p=0.012). Age and sex did not play an important role in most of the skills, with the exception of boys outperforming girls striking (p=0.009), dribbling (p=0.013), and throwing (p=0.000), and older children outperforming younger children in dribbling (p=0.002). The significant impact of the severity of visual impairment is likely due to decreased experiences and opportunities for children with more severe visual impairments. In addition, it is likely that these reduced experiences explain the lack of age-related differences in the CWVI. The large disparities in performance between children who are blind and their partially sighted peers give direction for instruction and future research. In addition, there is a critical need for intentional and specific instruction on motor skills at a younger age to enable CWVI to develop their gross motor skills.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2014 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2014.05.030