Grant: Travel Awards - Institute Community Support

Children with Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) struggle to perform everyday tasks due to coordination difficulties. A recent study found that 5-7 year old children with DCD have poorer performance on exercise tests compared to typically developing (TD) children due to lower confidence in their motor skills. Children's motivation also affects fitness performance. Yet, no research has looked at possible ways to increase confidence and motivation, which in turn could increase their performance on exercise tests. This study will investigate whether positive feedback ("I believe in you", "I know you are going to do a lot better than last time") from a research assistant posed as an athletic trainer can increase children's confidence, motivation, and exercise performance. 5 participants have completed the study to date (2 TD; 3 DCD). Participants completed questionnaires asking about their confidence and motivation for performing the upcoming exercise tests. About two weeks later they returned to the lab to complete the same questionnaires and exercise tests. However, before completing these measures, some participants received positive feedback from a researcher pretending to be an athletic trainer. Children with DCD did worse on all exercise tests than TD children. There were no differences between groups for confidence and motivation scores; however, DCD children who received positive feedback improved their performance on some exercise tests while DCD children who did not receive feedback did worse at the second appointment. We aim to recruit 50 children with DCD and 50 TD children for this study. Initial findings suggest exercise performance in children with DCD may be manipulated to improve performance. Findings from this study will help us find ways to build their confidence for difficult tasks requiring motor coordination and physical effort. Hopefully, this will encourage them to continue playing sports and other physical activities.