Implicit Motor Sequence Learning in Children With Learning Disabilities: Deficits Limited to a Subgroup With Low Perceptual Organization

Abstract

This study tested whether deficiencies in implicit motor sequence learning occurred exclusively in a subgroup of children with learning disabilities (LD). An experimental motor sequence task showed that LD children with low Perceptual Organization did not learn the sequence through implicit training, whereas they improved considerably after a few explicit test trials. In contrast, children with low Freedom From Distractibility (or sequencing) experienced the same benefit from implicit training as the control children. These results suggest that training motor skills (e.g., writing) should be adapted to suit the visuospatial abilities of a child with LD.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank all the children and their parents for their enthusiastic participation in the study; Ria Nijhuis-van der Sanden and Bert Steenbergen for their thorough assessment of this article; Judith Abma-Hill for reviewing the English language; and especially, Bouwien Smits-Engelsman for her inspiring contribution to the design of this experiment.