Neural control of leg stiffness during hopping in boys and men
Author
Oliver, Jon
Smith, Paul M.
Date
2010Type
Article
Publisher
Elsevier
ISSN
1050-6411
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The purpose of the study was to investigate whether boys and men utilise different control strategies whilst hopping. Eleven boys (11–12 yr old) and ten men completed hopping at 1.5 Hz, 3.0 Hz and at their preferred frequency. A footswitch measured contact and flight times, from which leg stiffness was calculated. Simultaneously, surface electromyograms (EMGs) of selected lower limb muscles were recorded and quantified for each 30 ms period during the first 120 ms post-ground contact. At 1.5 Hz there were no differences between the groups in relative stiffness or muscle activity. At 3.0 Hz men had significantly shorter contact times (P = 0.013), longer flight times (P = 0.002), greater relative stiffness (P = 0.01) and significantly greater soleus (P = 0.012) and vastus lateralis (P < 0.001) activity during the initial 30 ms post-ground contact. At the preferred frequency men hopped significantly faster than the boys (P = 0.007), with greater leg stiffness (P < 0.01) and with more extensor activity in most time periods. Boys and men demonstrated similar control strategies when hopping at a slow frequency, but when hopping frequency increased men were able to better increase feedforward and reflex muscle activity to hop with greater relative stiffness. © Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Journal/conference proceeding
Journal of Electromyography and Kinesiology
Citation
Oliver, J.L. and Smith, P.M. (2010) 'Neural control of leg stiffness during hopping in boys and men', Journal of Electromyography and Kinesiology, 20(5), pp.973-979.
Description
This article was published in Journal of Electromyography and Kinesiology in October 2010, available at http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jelekin.2010.03.011
Collections
- Sport Research Groups [1088]
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