Underlying neurophysiological and biomechanical mechanisms related to postural control of children with Developmental Coordination Disorder differ from those in typically developing children.
Count ankle commands and sensory weighting during quiet stance to see if a child with DCD needs prediction training or sensory re-balancing.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Godoi-Jacomassi et al. (2025) watched kids with Developmental Coordination Disorder stand still on a force plate.
They counted tiny ankle muscle bursts and tracked how each child used vision, touch, and inner-ear cues.
Same test was given to typically-developing kids so the teams could be compared head-to-head.
What they found
Kids with DCD sent out more postural commands yet swayed more, showing their plans were noisy.
They also leaned too hard on one sense and too little on another, a pattern called altered sensory weighting.
The study says the problem is two-part: bad predictions plus poor sensory mixing, not just weak muscles.
How this fits with other research
Spanoudis et al. (2011) saw the same group sway worse when a visual task got harder, hinting at overload.
Chung et al. (2011) added a moving room and found shaky optic-flow use; the new paper pins that under-use to spectral weighting, so it extends the old clue.
Velghe et al. (2025) meta-analysis shows training balance works, but no single method wins; knowing whether the child’s flaw is command noise or sensory weighting lets you pick the drill that fits.
Nobusako et al. (2020) found a wider sense-of-agency window in DCD, another sign that timing inside the motor loop is loose, matching the extra commands seen here.
Why it matters
You can run a 60-second quiet-stand test with any force plate or Wii balance board.
Look at two numbers: how many ankle bursts happen (structure) and how much the child banks on vision versus feel (spectral weighting).
If bursts are high, give prediction games like timed weight shifts; if sensory mix is off, add eyes-closed or foam standing.
This quick split saves weeks of trial-and-error and keeps kids from tagging every balance task as hard or boring.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
BACKGROUND: Although many studies have provided important insights into postural control in children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD), relevant aspects remain unresolved. AIMS: To investigate the underlying mechanisms related to postural control in children with and without DCD during standing tasks, using global, structural, and spectral descriptors of the Center of Pressure (CoP) trajectory. METHODS: Sixty-eight children (9.88 ± 0.96 years) participated in this study, divided into two groups: DCD and typically developing (TD) peers. Participants stood upright on a force platform for 30 seconds, under different conditions of vision (open or closed eyes), and surface (compliant or firm). To compute features from the CoP displacements, global, structural, and spectral analyses were employed. OUTCOMES AND RESULTS: The main results showed that children with DCD (a) displayed higher variability and velocity of the CoP displacement than TD children (global descriptors), (b) needed more postural commands to control balance when compared to TD children (structural descriptors), and (c) used sensory inputs differently when compared to TD children (spectral descriptors). Moreover, the differences between groups of children and the effects of vision and somatosensory inputs were task- and outcome-dependent. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS: Postural deficits in children with DCD can be traced to an action problem based on poorer prediction (structural results) and a perception problem of environmental changes (spectral results). Structural descriptors can assess functional stability and changes in anticipatory commands, while spectral descriptors may indicate (in)adequate use of sensory information, which can help to choose the content of tasks in interventions.
Research in developmental disabilities, 2025 · doi:10.1016/j.ridd.2025.104939