Does Gait changes while texting…..

Does texting alter your gait pattern ? It seems to slow you down, and according to this study, alter firing patterns of muscles about your ankle. Perhaps you are trying to maintain stability? It is interesting that ankle dorsiflexion actually increased and plantar flexion decreased.

There is slightly reduced their gait speed to safely cope with the task. There is Gait adaptations in terms of 1) sub-phases of stance.  

[restrict] 2) stride-to-stride variability, 3) ankle and knee joint kinematics, 4) muscle activation patterns, and 5) co-contraction of ankle antagonist muscles were comprehensively documented for the first time.

This seems a CNS adaptation under dual task, responding to an increased need for ankle stabilization.

Young adults showed, overall, small gait modifications that could be mainly ascribable to gait speed reduction and a modified body posture due to phone handling. There is no significant alterations of ankle and knee kinematics and a slightly delayed activation onset of the left gastrocnemius lateralis. However, they found an increased co-contraction of tibialis anterior and gastrocnemius lateralis, especially during mid-stance. Conversely, they found a reduced co-contraction during terminal stance.

Image courtesy:lermagazine.com

Full text :

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4579642/

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