Complex Motor Functions of the Preferred and Non-Preferred Hands in Brain-Damaged and Normal Children

A previous study of early school-age children indicated that a brain-damaged group took more time in normal name-writing than did a group of normal children with both the preferred hand and the non-preferred hand. In addition, the difference between the 2 hands was greater for the brain-damaged children. These results could have been attributed at least in part, considering the age range of 6 to 8 yr., to lack of development of skill in name-writing. Therefore, the study was replicated using children in the 9- to 14-yr. age range since name-writing should have been a practiced and perhaps over-learned skill for older children. Groups were formed by matching pairs of brain-damaged and normal children for race, sex, and age. The results, found by applying converted scores derived from the study of younger children, confirmed the findings with younger children and permitted differentiation of the brain-damaged and normal groups with almost the same degree of accuracy achieved in the prior study. The results suggest that the findings are not due to lack of development of name-writing skill but instead reflect a difference in normal tempo, associated with brain damage, in a highly practiced, complex motor function.