Kids falling down
Posted by gregdowney on May 27, 2008
If, like me, you find the sense of balance and its development fascinating, or if you just want to learn more about toddlers falling over, check out Cognitive Daily’s wonderful piece discussing research on toddlers’ balance. A research team put weighted vests on toddlers to see how they would compensate when they tried to walk, and the poor little folks leaned the wrong way. That is, put a bit of weight on a toddler’s back, and he or she tends to lean backward to try to compensate. Man, little kids are ka-razy!
The piece by Dave Munger is, What backpack-wearing toddlers can tell us about how kids learn to walk. As always, Munger’s discussion is very thorough and gives a great sense for the original research. The work is reminiscent of the research of the late Esther Thelen, one of the psychologists who really opened my eyes to dynamic systems theory and a rethinking of developmental theory.
The Cultural Brain in Five Flavors « Neuroanthropology said
[...] To take one example, rather than seeing our sense of balance as an innate instinct, balance is a trained and plastic skill, integrating various parts of the brain depending on the task at hand, whether that is dancing or just learning to walk. [...]
Fall prevention in older people — Stephen Lord at HCSNet « Neuroanthropology said
[...] know, I’m particularly interested in the way humans maintain equilibrium (see earlier posts, Kids falling down and Equilibrium, modularity, and training the brain-body, and Daniel’s post of some great [...]