6.8: Motor Development- Relation with Other Areas of Development
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Mother Development and Other Developmental Domains
While motor development is often presented as an individual chapter separate from other developmental domains (e.g., language, social-emotional, cognition) the reality is that children’s motor abilities are developing alongside these other domains and growth in one domain often influences the other domains. Motor skills are at the core of infants’ and toddlers’ everyday actions and interactions and consequently affect subsequent perceptual, cognitive, and language development (Bushnell & Boudreau, 1993; Gibson, 1988). Piaget (1952) suggested a relation between motor and cognitive development and noted that infants’ own actions and resulting sensorimotor experiences are critical for their learning about the environment and the objects within it. Since Piaget’s original observations, several studies have reported evidence for relations between motor skills and development in seemingly unrelated domains. [1]
Growing evidence suggests that acquiring more advanced control over body position affords infants' opportunities for learning and exploration (Franchak, 2020; Gibson, 1988; Libertus & Hauf, 2017). For example, infants' visual experiences differ according to body position: while prone, infants' field of view is dominated by the ground surface and objects near the body, whereas upright infants have a more expansive view of their surroundings that includes distant objects and faces (Franchak et al., 2011, 2018; Luo & Franchak, 2020; Kretch et al., 2014). Sitting facilitates visual and manual exploration of objects compared with laying prone or supine (Luo & Franchak, 2020; Soska & Adolph, 2014). Upright locomotion (walking) compared with prone locomotion (crawling) allows infants to travel farther, more easily carry objects, and elicits different social responses from caregivers (Adolph & Tamis-LeMonda, 2014; Gibson, 1988; Karasik et al., 2014). Accordingly, learning to sit and walk is linked with downstream improvements in language learning and spatial cognition (He et al., 2015; Moore et al., 2019; Oudgenoeg-Paz et al., 2012, 2015; Soska et al., 2010; Walle, 2016; Walle & Campos, 2014; West et al., 2019). Presumably, these facilitative effects result from infants spending more time sitting, standing, and walking. For example, mastering the ability to sit independently nearly doubled the amount of time that 6 month olds spent sitting (both independent and supported sitting) in daily life compared with 6 month old not yet sitting (Franchak, 2019) and infants who spend more time sitting have increased opportunities to explore objects with both hands. [2]
Developmental Cascades Theory
The developmental cascades hypothesis emphasizes the consequences following achievement of new motor skills as a driving force during development. Developmental cascades refer to the cumulative consequences of advances in one domain (e.g., motor skills) on later behaviors or abilities (Fry & Hale, 1996; Gottlieb, 1991; Masten & Cicchetti, 2010). Gaining a new skill leads to significant and long lasting changes in the child’s everyday experience by altering what kind of information is accessible and how others respond to the child. According to the developmental cascades theory, the onset of a new motor skill may provide infants with access to new learning opportunities associated with that motor skill. For example, being able to sit without support frees the hands for manual exploration of objects and enables learning about object features such as weight, texture, and function (Lederman & Klatzky, 2009; Rochat & Goubet, 1995). Sitting also frees the hands for the production of communicative gestures, which have been found to support language development (Iverson & Goldin-Meadow, 2005). Further, sitting changes the infants’ point-of-view, providing novel perceptual experiences and encouraging face-to-face exchanges with their caregivers. And finally, parents react to changes in infants’ abilities and adjust how they respond to the child (e.g., Karasik et al., 2014). [1]
Relationship Between Motor Skills and Language Development
While motor and language development may seem like two very different developmental areas, research has shown, within the first three years of life, that these two areas are strongly related (Schneider & Iverson, 2021). Infants and toddlers who achieve motor milestones earlier show greater language abilities. For example, in a large group of children between 10 to 14 months of age, some will be walking while others will not yet be able to walk. Children who begin to walk earlier have larger receptive and productive vocabularies than those who are not yet able to walk (Carina, Leinweber & Ritterfeld, 2019; He, Walle & Campos, 2015; Walle & Campos, 2014). The onset of independent sitting and walking have both been found to predict later productive vocabulary sizes between 16 and 28 months (Oudgenoeg-Paz, Volman & Leseman, 2012). This relationship between motor development and language development actually begins even earlier. Infants, between 3 to 5 months of age, who can independently sit earlier than others, show greater language abilities as toddlers (Libertus & Violi, 2016). A large study of 62,944 children found that motor skills at 18 months were predictive of subsequent language skills at 36 months of age (Wang, Lekhal, Aarø & Schjølberg, 2014). In addition to gross motor skills, fine motor skills between 12 and 18 months of age have been found to predict expressive language at 36 months in infants at a high genetic risk for ASD (LeBarton & Iverson, 2013). [1]
Why is there a relationship between motor abilities and later language abilities? It is unlikely that the acquisition of walking per se causes infants to develop language, just as it is unlikely that infant language causes the onset of walking. Rather, the onset of walking increases the infant's visual field (Kretch et al., 2014) and permits greater flexibility with which to view the environment (Frank et al., 2013). These physical changes may promote infant following of adult attentional cues, and thereby facilitate language learning. Engaging in joint attention behavior is essential for the development of language (Tomasello, 1988, 1995). Such episodes of joint engagement occur when one individual directs the attention of another to a shared referent, such as an object or event. Multiple studies have found that infant following of adult attentional cues is related to language development (Brooks & Meltzoff, 2005; Morales et al., 1998; Mundy et al., 1995; Smith et al., 1988; Tomasello & Todd, 1983). Likewise, infant initiation of joint engagement, such as pointing, is associated with later language development (Brooks & Meltzoff, 2008; LeBarton et al., 2015). Perhaps not surprisingly, infant joint attention, particularly following adult gaze, also develops markedly following the infant's first birthday (Morales et al., 2000; Morissette et al., 1995), when infants typically begin to walk. [3]
Furthermore, infant walking also has a significant impact on how the infant engages with the caregiver. Walking infants have been observed to be more likely to access objects located further away than crawling infants (Clearfield, 2011; Karasik et al., 2011). Additionally, engaging in mobile bids for the parent's attention, such as carrying an object to the parent, elicits more interactive, and verbally rich responses by the parent and such bids are more frequent by walking than crawling infants (Karasik et al., 2014). Walking infants have also been found to direct the parent's attention to objects using vocalizations and gestures more than crawling infants (Clearfield et al., 2008; Clearfield, 2011; Karasik et al., 2011). These findings indicate that not only may the walking infant be more attuned to follow adult attentional cues, but they also help to generate social contexts in which they themselves elicit parent attention. The onset of walking affords infants new ways to communicate (freeing the hands for gesture and by being able to carry move objects) and share their interests which results in richer language from caregivers (West & Iverson, 2021). [3]
Relationship between Motor Skills and Developmental Delays and Disabilities
As motor development can be tracked early on in infancy and toddlerhood, motor skills can be used as a potential early marker for later outcomes in children at-risk of a delay or disability (Bhat et al., 2012; Flanagan et al., 2012; Lebarton & Iverson, 2013; Libertus et al., 2014). Research has found that delays in motor development are linked to diagnoses such as Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) and developmental language disorders (Leonard & Hill, 2014; West, 2018). Infants at high familial risk for ASD (infants, who have an older sibling with an ASD diagnosis) and who receive an ASD diagnosis later in childhood, show reduced fine motor and grasping skills (Choi, Leech, Tager-Flusberg & Nelson, 2018; Libertus et al., 2014) and delayed development of posture skills (i.e., sitting and standing) (Nickel et al., 2013). More children with a developmental language disorder are late in reaching gross and particularly fine motor milestones, than children without a developmental language disorder (Diepeveen et al, 2018). Motor delays are also commonly reported in children with Down syndrome (Vicari, 2006), Williams syndrome (Masataka, 2001) and in children born preterm (Cameron et al., 2021; Caravale et al., 2005; van Haastert et al., 2006). [1] [4]
[1] Libertus & Violi (2016). Sit to talk: relation between motor skills and language development in infancy. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 475. CC by 4.0
[2] Franchak et al., (2021). A contactless method for measuring full-day, naturalistic motor behavior using wearable inertial sensors. Frontiers in Psychology, 4632. CC by 4.0
[3] Walle (2016). Infant social development across the transition from crawling to walking. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 960. CC by 4.0
[2] Libertus & Landa (2014). Scaffolded reaching experiences encourage grasping activity in infants at high risk for autism. Frontiers in Psychology, 5, 1071. CC by 4.0