Data for Coordinating movement in a novel pedalo task: a comparison of children with and without Developmental Coordination Disorder

Children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) have been shown to have clearly different coordination patterns compared to their typically developing counterparts. However, it is unclear whether some of these factors are driven by the fact that typically developing children tend to be more skilled at the task on which coordination is being measured. The current study used a novel pedalo task to measure coordination in order to eliminate the difference in prelearned skill. Twenty eight children (8 years -16 years), 14 with DCD and 14 without were recruited for this study. Children pedalled along an 8m line for 20 practice trials. Movement of 7th Cervical Vertebra, shoulders, elbows, wrists, hips, knees, feet and toes was recorded. Measures of movement outcome and quantitative and qualitative descriptions of movement coordination were extracted for the first five trials compared to the last five. Both groups of children speeded up and produced smoother movement at the end of practice compared to the start. Both before and after practice children with DCD had a greater number of degrees of freedom to coordinate movement, however, there were no group differences for variability either across trials or within trials. The qualitative description of coordination demonstrates that children with DCD tended to show a higher inter-limb coordination of the feet compared to their typically developing counterparts. Finally, the only factors predicting change in movement outcome was self-efficacy and related experience. These findings demonstrate the importance of self-efficacy in early practice of a novel task.