Age-Related Changes in Smoothness of Gait of Healthy Children and Early Adolescents

Abstract

In this study, we acquired and processed trunk accelerations during level walking in 85 children aged 8-13 years to calculate spatio-temporal parameters and Harmonic Ratio (HR), which is a metrics representative of gait smoothness and step-to-step symmetry. The results show that while spatio-temporal parameters remain unchanged once normalized considering individuals’ anthropometry, significantly higher values of HR for both the antero-posterior and vertical directions were found in participants aged 12–13 with respect to those of 8–9. This indicates an improvement of gait symmetry, which suggests that the gait maturation process is still ongoing for the age ranges tested here.

Keywords:

• gait maturation
• Harmonic Ratio (HR)
• children
• symmetry
• smoothness

Acknowledgments

The authors wish to thank the Director of the school involved in the research (Professor Maria Marcella Vacca) and the teachers for their invaluable support in the organization of test sessions.