Development of human precision grip. III: Integration of visual size cues during the programming of isometric forces

Recent evidence has shown that visual and haptical size information can be used by adults to estimate the weight of the object, forming the basis of the force programming during precision grip (Gordon et al. 1991a, b,). The present study examined the development of the capacity to use visual size information. In the first experiment, 30 children (age 1-7 years) and 10 adults performed a series of lifts with two boxes presented in an unpredictable order. The boxes were equal in weight but unequal in size and were attached to an instrumented grip handle which measured the employed grip force, load force, position and their corresponding time derivatives. The isometric force development was not influenced by the box size before the age of 3. However, the children aged 3 years and older demonstrated greater visual influences on the force programming than adults. To determine more precisely when children began to use visual size information, a second experiment in which the size and weight covaried was performed on 15 children. Children still did not use the size information during the force programming until the later half of the third year. It is concluded that this ability, probably involving associative transformations between the size and weight of objects, emerges around one year after anticipatory control based on somatosensory information pertaining to the weight of the object.