Category: Pediatric Rehabilitation; Athlete Development & Sports Rehabilitation; Measurement
Objective : To investigate physical activity level of preschool children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and the relationship between motor performance.
Design : Cross-sectional correlation study
Setting : The participants were recruited from the Early intervention center in National Taiwan University Hospital Hsinchu Branch by occupational therapists and clinical psychologists.
Participants (or Animals, Specimens, Cadavers) : A convenience sample of 105 children with autism spectrum disorderASD diagnosedis by the children pediatric psychiatry doctorist in National Taiwan University Hospital Hsinchu Branch at age 4 to 6 years old. All participants had no comorbidity of other disease.
Interventions : Not applicable.
Main Outcome Measure(s) :
We used an accelerometer to collect objective physical activity data and preestablishedpre-established cut points of preschool children.Motor performance is was measured by the Movement Assessment Battery of Children-second edition (MABC-2).
Results : In this preliminary study, there were 5 children completed the study and the age range of the participants were 52-73 months. The major finding suggests that cChildren with ASD spent less time in moderate to vigorous physical activity (MVPA) every day compared to the pre-established reference data. Average time spendt in moderate to vigorous level of physical activity in children with ASD are were 63 minutes per day and the time range is 162 -23 minutes. They spent most of the time in sedentary and light physical activity. In addition, there is was no relationship between physical activity level and motor performance. However, all the participants had motor difficulties, the percentile were all below 15percentiles.
Conclusions : Preschool children with ASD spent less time in MVPA and spent more time in sedentary activities. No relevant in motor performance and physical activity was observed. The findings suggest that practitioners can provide preschool children with ASD a physical activity intervention to increase MVPA.
Yi-Shan Sung
– Occupational therapist, 1.National Taiwan University Hospital Hsin-Chu Branch 2.Institute of Allied Health Sciences, National Cheng Kung University, Hsichu, HsinchuLing-Yi Lin
– Associate Professor, Institute of Allied Health Science, Department of Occupational therapy, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Tainan