Effect of a vestibular-stimulating training program on motor skills in conjunction with cognitive aptitude of young school-aged children

Abstract

Introduction. The current study was conducted to evaluate the effects of the Minds-in-Motion Maze program on motor and cognitive abilities in school-aged children. Methods. The experimental design used was a randomised controlled trial. Participants, belonging to a public primary school, were 100 young children (50% boys) ranging from 6.00 to 8.50 years old (7.32 ± 0.82 years in average). They were randomly assigned to experimental and control groups (50 subjects/each), and two dropped out from each group. While the control group received unstructured physical activity, the children in the experimental group engaged in the Minds-in-Motion Maze vestibular stimulation program (24 weeks of a 30-minute structured PA on a daily basis). A pre-and post-test were conducted to evaluate the performance in motor skills and cognitive ability using the Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor ProficiencyTM Second Edition, complete form and Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children, Fourth Edition. Results. The analysed data indicated that engaging in Minds-in-Motion Maze activities positively influenced the motor and cognitive abilities among the children. The between-group analysis exhibited strong significant improvement in the experimental group compared to the control group (p < 0.05), which did not show significant development. Boys outperformed girls on most tests, notably as age increased. The within-groups analysis (experimental group) demonstrated significant differences in the post-intervention gains of all motor and cognitive parameters (p < 0.05). Conclusions. Taken together, the current results reinforce causal evidence for the effects of Minds-in-Motion Maze based physical activity on improving both motor skills and cognitive aptitude in school-aged children.