Effects of Gait and Cognitive Task Difficulty on Cognitive-Motor Interference in Aging

Table 2

Mean (SD) gait speeds (m/s) for each condition and each gait task. Values are only from the subjects with gait speed data for all conditions.

Gait task	Young adults (𝑛=19)								Older adults (𝑛=12)
	Single-task		Dual-stroop		Dual-clock		Mean		Single-task		Dual-stroop		Dual-clock		Mean
SS	1.50	(0.17)	1.49	(0.16)	1.46	(0.22)	1.48	(0.17)	1.31	(0.29)	1.24^a	(0.26)	1.28	(0.31)	1.28	(0.29)
FC	1.97^b	(0.21)	1.90	(0.17)	1.90^a,b	(0.20)	1.93 ^b	(0.19)	1.51^b	(0.37)	1.44^b	(0.39)	1.39^a,b	(0.36)	1.44 ^b	(0.37)
OB	1.96^c	(0.21)	1.88^a,c	(0.19)	1.87^a,c	(0.21)	1.90 ^c	(0.20)	1.42^c,d	(0.40)	1.32^a,c,d	(0.36)	1.30^a,d	(0.36)	1.35 ^d	(0.37)
Mean	1.81	(0.17)	1.76 ^a	(0.15)	1.75 ^a	(0.18)	1.77	(0.24)	1.41	(0.35)	1.33	(0.33)	1.32 ^a	(0.34)	1.36 *	(0.24)

SS: walking at self-selected speed, FC: walking at fastest comfortable speed, OB: walking at fastest comfortable speed with obstacle crossing.
^aSignificant differences between single-task and dual-task (none of the differences between the two dual-tasks were significant), 𝑃≤.05 (Tukey’s HSD).
^bSignificant differences between self-selected and fast, 𝑃≤.05 (Tukey’s HSD).
^cSignificant differences between self-selected and fast obstacle, 𝑃≤.05 (Tukey’s HSD).
^dSignificant differences between fast and fast obstacle, 𝑃≤.05 (Tukey’s HSD).
*Significant difference between older adults and young adults, 𝑃<.001.