For this part of the study, dynamic posturography will be combined with the cognitive testing. Just prior to beginning a dynamic posturography trial, participants will be provided with an alpha-numeric sequence. Following the 20 second posturography trial, the participants will be instructed to indicate the sequence in reverse order. Performance on balance and cognitive task will be determined as discussed earlier. In addition, the cognitive-motor task cost on equilibrium score will be determined as follows:
Cognitive-motor task cost on equilibrium score=
((Equilibrium score from cognitive-motor task condition)-(Equilibrium score from dynamic posturography alone))/(Equilibrium score from dynamic posturography …show more content…
The independent variables will be group (survivors and controls) and task condition (dynamic posturography only and dynamic posturography with added cognitive load). A separate analysis will be performed for each dependent variable; equilibrium score, vision ratio, somatosensory ratio and vestibular ratio. To adjust for the multiple comparisons alpha level will be set on .001.
Hypothesis #3
An independent sample t test will be used also to compare cognitive motor task cost on equilibrium score between survivors and controls. The independent variable will be group (survivors and controls) and the dependent variable will be cognitive-motor task cost on equilibrium score.
Hypothesis #4
Multivariate Analysis of Variance (MANOVA) will be used to examine if there is a difference in cognitive performance between different conditions of SOT between ALL survivors and controls. For this analysis, the independent variables will be the group (survivors and controls) and task condition (Cognitive only and added cognitive load during dynamic posturography), the dependent variables will be cognitive performance in each condition of the SOT (cognitive performance in condition 1 through