Motor and Visuomotor Skills of Children with Asperger's Disorder: Preliminary Findings

While motor clumsiness is frequently described as an associated feature of Asperger's Disorder, little research has examined specific motor skills and the relation among aspects of motor performance in this population. The present purpose was to present preliminary findings for three aspects of Asperger's: the presence and magnitude of gross motor and fine motor deficits, the presence and magnitude of visuomotor deficits, and the relation between motor functioning and visuomotor skills. 17 boys, 6 to 13 years old, with Asperger's were tested using standardized measures of gross, fine, and visuomotor skills. Statistically significant deficits were found for the sample's scores compared with values for the general population (using one-sample t tests), but none for fine motor vs gross motor skills (using a dependent sample t test). Significant positive correlations were found for gross motor skills with visuomotor skills (.73) and for fine motor skills with visuomotor skills (.71). Tentative suggestions for clinical assessment were proposed.