Acquisition and Consolidation of Procedural Motor Learning in Children with Developmental Coordination Disorder

Children with developmental coordination disorder (DCD) sometimes have difficulties in performing and learning motor skills. The aim of the present study was to investigate procedural motor acquisition and learning in DCD children. 12 children with developmental coordination disorder and 12 normal children with matched IQ and chronological age were selected from 8-12-year-old male students of Tabriz city by purposive sampling method. A modified version of rotary pursuit task and variables of total time on target (TOT), consecutive time on target (CTT), distance from the target (DT), distance from the path (DP) and relative phase were used to assess procedural motor learning. After training in the acquisition phase, subjects participated in the immediate 10-minute retention test and the consolidation test after 24 hours of rest. Analysis of data by analysis of variance with repeated measures showed no significant differences between the two groups in TOT, DP, and relative phase in the acquisition phase, but there were significant differences in CTT and DT. There were significant differences in TOT, CTT, and DT in the retention phase, but there was no significant differences in DP and relative phase. Generally, the results suggested that despite the low performance of their procedural motor learning, DCD children were able to acquire motor coordination patterns.