Hi Marcelo,

could you elaborate a bit what you want to do? What is your study design, what is your hypothesis? Very generally speaking, if you want to train for unpredictable situations, I would suggest to train in many different situations, as balance training seems to have very specific effects (see for example our recent publications on the subject, links below). Also, I recommend not to view postural control/balance as a general ability, but rather as a set of skills.

Cheers,

Andreas

Article Specificity of Balance Training in Healthy Individuals: A Sy...

Article Task-specificity of balance training

Dear Marcelo,

With regard to your specific interest in dual-task methodology in combination with anticipatory postural control, you might be interested in a paper by Müller, Jennings, Redfern, & Furman (2004), published in Journal of Motor Behavior, 36, 137-146, on the effect of preparation on dual-task performance in postural control.

These authors combined a rapid destabilizing floor translation and a simple (auditory) reaction time task. Translations were either cued or non-cued. Dual- task interference was found only in the first 50 ms, and cueing had an effect on both postural recovery response and RT performance. As a consequence, the authors argue for competition for a common central mechanism.

See also – along the same line of research paradigm – a paper by Morris, Iansek, Smithson, Huxham (2000), published in Gait and Posture, 12, 205-2016, on postural stability in Parkinson’s disease.

I’ll attach both papers to this notice.

Best,

Klaus Blischke

Thanks for your response Andreas.

I'm running a study in which the volunteers need to reach a target placed to different distances of them (measure of the right hand fingers to the wall or target), in unipodal stance. This target should be touched with one hand, and they must be always in unipodal stance, preferably the left member. However, I'm in the first phase of this study, in which I'm making the adjustments in the protocol (experimental procedures). 

Best regards,

In that case, you could place the subjects on a force plate and use the center of force to quantify their ability to stand as still as possible on one leg, and their distance to the target to quantify their performance in the second pointing task.

However, I would be careful with the instructions you give the participants with respect to task priority, as it has been shown that task performance depends on task priority and that older participants with higher fall risk tend to prioritize not falling over additional tasks. 

Dear Marcelo,

I would advise you to see the articles

Anticipatory postural adjustment before bimanual unloading reactions: The role of the motor cortex in motor learning

O V Kazennikov · I A Solopova · V L Talis · M E Ioffe

[Show abstract]

Full-text · Article · Oct 2007 · Neuroscience and Behavioral Physiology

Interaction between the vertical posture and movement control systems during a quick voluntary arm raise

M. I. Lipshits · O. V. Kazennikov

Dependence of the motor response time in discrimination task on the character of visual information available

O. V. Kazennikov · Yu. S. Levik · M. I. Lipshits

and other publications of these authors on the subject. I am familiar with the Russian texts and reports. I think they might be interested in you.

Best

Pavel Kruchinin