Characterization of motor performance of infants at high risk for physical disability

Impairment of children's motor performance might limit children's participation in family and community life. Understanding the natural history of development in children with cerebral palsy (CP) is important for linking different impairments to the resulting functional limitations in children's occupational performance and for studying the consequences of early intervention.;A series of secondary analyses of a pre-existing data set were done with the purpose of examining the performance on the Test of Infant Motor Performance (TIMP) from 0–4 months of age of a group of infants later diagnosed as having cerebral palsy (CP), developmental delay (DD) or typical development (TD). The purposes of this dissertation research were (1) to describe the early patterns of motor development over time (i.e., from 0 to 4 months corrected age) of infants who are at high risk for developmental disability, including CP, on the TIMP, (2) to systematically document the presence of specific behavioral differences in test/item performance that might be related to or indicative of developmental disability, and (3) to explore the developmental process underlying the changes observed during this period (i.e., acquisition, deletion, accumulation, substitution of specific behaviors).;Different patterns of movement between typically and atypically developing children and also children with developmental delay were identified (e.g., children atypically developing had more difficulty with antigravity, isolated and coordinated movements; children with developmental delay had more difficulty with antigravity movements). Ages at which infants with CP were first recognized as presenting delayed motor performance (e.g., 7 days, 2/4 weeks) as well as ages at which infants differed most among themselves on the TIMP performance were found (e.g., 8/9 weeks and 12/13 weeks). Atypical performances on single items combined differently at different ages preventing the children from developing as expected for typically developing children. Hypotheses regarding why specific items behaved differently and implications of these differences are discussed. A taxonomy of behavioral differences (mistakes) in TIMP performance that might characterize infants with atypical development was also developed.