Article

The link between emotions and postural control has been rather unexplored in
children. The objective of the present study was to establish whether the
projection of pleasant and unpleasant videos with similar arousal would lead to
specific postural responses such as postural freezing, aversive or appetitive
behaviours as a function of age. We hypothesized that postural sway would
similarly increase with the viewing of high arousal videos in children and
adults, whatever the emotional context. 40 children participated in the study and
were divided into two groups of age: group 7-9 years (n=23; mean age=8 years +/-
0.7) and group 10-12 years (n=17; mean age=11 years +/- 0.7). 19 adults (mean
age=25.8 years +/- 4.4) also took part in the experiment. They viewed emotional
videos while standing still on a force platform. Centre of foot pressure (CoP)
displacements were analysed. Antero-posterior, medio-lateral mean speed and sway
path length increased similarly with the viewing of high arousal movies in the
younger, older children, and adults. Our findings suggest that the development of
postural control is not influenced by the maturation of the emotional processing.
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Langue : ANGLAIS