The relationship between whole body coordination and head movement

Eyes and head movements play several major roles in everyday human life, such as walking and in gait stabilization. The fixation on objects while moving can also influence our gait pattern. In this book we examined the influence of head movements on gait. The aim of this book was to find out if there is a correlation between head movement and whole body coordination. Study participants walked for 6 minutes on a treadmill in the laboratory. For the recording of the data we used a three dimensional motion tracking (VICON system). Participants were instructed to focus their gaze while walking on one of four blinking LEDs, that were arranged in a T-shape. The LEDs were glowing on a vertical (trial T1 & trial T2) and horizontal (trial T3 & trial T4) line and in a randomized order (trial T5 & trial T6), alternating one minute in a slow sequence and one minute in a fast sequence.