A test of motor (not executive) planning in developmental coordination disorder and autism.

Grip selection tasks have been used to test "planning" in both autism and developmental coordination disorder (DCD). We differentiate between motor and executive planning and present a modified motor planning task. Participants grasped a cylinder in 1 of 2 orientations before turning it clockwise or anticlockwise.

The effect of orientation on prehension movement time.

We explored the relationship between hand orientation and movement time. Three groups of participants (n = 8 per group) were asked to grasp an object rotated in one of the following planes: (1) coronal; (2) sagittal; (3) horizontal. In the coronal plane, the rotational requirements directly mapped onto the neuromuscular demands associated with a single joint-level degree of freedom movement.