Associations Between Object Control Skills and Cognitive Functions in Boys, Younger and Older Men: Across-Sectional Study

ABSTRACT

Purpose: This study aimed to explore the association of cognitive function and process- as well product-oriented outcomes of object control skills (OCS) in boys, younger and older men. Methods: A total of 77 male participants took part in this study, including 35 primary school children (9.04 ± 0.53 years), 22 younger adults (23.5 ± 2.34 years), and 20 older adults (69.5 ± 4.43 years). We assessed the process-oriented performance of throwing, kicking, and catching performance using the component approach. For the product-oriented performance, throwing and kicking velocity was recorded with a STALKER SOLO 2.0 radar gun. For catching, the number of caught balls was assessed. Cognitive function was evaluated using the Trail-Making-Test (TMT) one day later. Results: Younger adults performed better in both domains than the other two groups. The results of the children and older adults were comparable in the motor and cognitive domains. However, the older adults yielded significantly better results for the process-oriented catching and product-oriented throwing performances. Moderate to strong correlations exist between OCS- and TMT performance, with significant correlations predominantly between product-oriented OCS results and TMT in children. Conclusion: The results of both domains support a hypothetical lifespan developmental trajectory with a progression from childhood to younger adult age and a degression in older adults. Furthermore, our results suggest that the suspected relationship between motor and cognitive function depends on age, the analyzed cognitive and motor skills, and the applied methodological approach (process-oriented vs. product-oriented).

KEYWORDS:

• Children
• executive functions
• older adults
• process- and product-oriented assessment
• throwing, kicking, catching
• Trail-Making-Test
• younger adults

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Patrick Schütze for their valuable assistance in the data collection process. Also, the authors wish to thank the school and all the children, adults, and older adults for participating in this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Ethics

Informed written consent was obtained prior to the beginning of testing. In the case of children (<18 yrs), additional informed written consent was also provided from their parent or guardian. Participants were told that they could opt out at any time. All procedures were in accordance to the Declaration of Helsinki (2013) with ethical standards, legal requirements and international norms. The institutional ethics committee of the University of Stuttgart (approval number: AZ 22-003) approved the project.

Notes

¹ Motor skills are defined as a task group or class of purposeful and deliberate movements with comparable sequences and functions that can be modified through training, experience, and reinforcement. Elementary motor skills are divided into skills for locomotion (including walking, running, hopping, jumping) and object control (e.g., throwing, catching, shooting) (Holfelder & Schott, 2014).

² The term cognition refers to all conscious and unconscious information-processing processes of an intelligent system or the mental activity of a human being. The cognitive performance of a human being includes processes of perception, attention, memory, thinking, learning, remembering, motivation and problem solving as well as language comprehension.

Additional information

Funding

The work was not supported by any funding agencies.