Organization of Sensory Systems in Postural Control of Children: A Review of Literature

Improvement of motion skills in children is facilitated by improved posture control. However, there is no comprehensive study on how to organize posture control sensing systems in children. Therefore, the present study was conducted to provide a comprehensive review on organizing sensory systems visual, proprioception, and vestibular in children’s posture control.

A comprehensive review was performed on the organization of sensory systems in postural control of children by searching the following English databases: Science Direct, PubMed, Web of Science, EBSCO, Springer, COCHRANCE REVIEW, Pedro, EMBASE, CINAHL, and Google Scholar, using the following keywords: visual system, proprioception system, somatosensory, vestibular system, computerized dynamic posturography, postural control, postural stability, children, child, postural balance, quiet stance, postural sway, stabilography, body sway, sensory organization, human development, and child development. In addition, Persian databases, such as MAGIRAN, IRANDOC, IranMedex, MedLib, Sid, and Google Scholar were searched for the following keywords: balance in children, postural control in children, postural control, balance, visual system, vestibular system, proprioception system, somatosensory, and sensory systems, from among papers published from 1985 to January 2020. Moreover, unable to find articles online, manual search and full review of resources of the articles were carried out to find the respective articles. Inclusion criteria included: study on the reweighting of sensory system, given the target population (children), study on healthy children, and use of computer devices that accurately measure the reweighting of sensory systems.

A total number of 16 studies were chosen based on our measures and objectives. In five studies, it was concluded that proprioception is organized much faster than visual system. However, three studies reported that visual system in children was organized faster than proprioception, similar to that in adults. It was agreed that vestibular system developed later compared with the other two systems to adult form.

In conclusion, the growth of postural control occurs by age non-linearly, and there are changes in some ages. It can be inferred that children are dependent on the visual system at first, but as time goes, by walking and standing time, they become more dependent on the proprioception system than on the visual system. Also, it seems that the organization of the proprioception system occurs sooner than the visual system. It can also be reported that the progression of the visual system does not occur linearly and is critical in some age groups. In addition, the vestibular system matures compared with than other systems.