Effects of Creative Movement, General Movement, or Seated Play Interventions on Motor Performance in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial

Background: Children with ASD experience significant gross motor challenges that could be addressed using motor interventions. However, contemporary ASD interventions that are sedentary in nature often target communication and fine motor skills and not children's gross motor difficulties.

Methods: In the current pilot RCT, we evaluated changes in various motor outcomes (i.e., gross/fine motor coordination, locomotor skills, functional endurance, and praxis/imitation performance) following two types of whole-body motor interventions (Creative Movement (CM) or General Movement (GM)) and compared them to a Sedentary Play (SP) intervention focused on improving fine motor skills in children with ASD. Forty-five children with ASD (Mean Age ±SE: 8.7 ± 0.3, 38 males) were randomly assigned to the CM, GM, or SP groups and received 8 weeks of group-specific training.

Results: Both CM and GM interventions led to medium-to-large improvements in gross motor performance, including improved body coordination, strength/agility, locomotor skills, and walking endurance. Children in the CM group additionally showed medium-to-large-sized improvements in praxis performance, while children in the SP group showed improvements in fine motor performance. These training-related improvements were supported by improvements reported via parental questionnaires.

Conclusions: Researchers and clinicians should incorporate whole-body interventions targeting gross motor skills in the plan of care for children with ASD.