Is motor imagery already present before age of 5? A pilot action research study.

Motor Imagery (MI), that is the ability to mentally rehearse motor acts without overt body movements, is an important acquisition for children to learn, program and control movements. There are evidences that this capacity is present from the age of 5, but there are only few studies with children under 7 years old. This because of some theoretical and methodological problems. In this regard, we longitudinally studied 16 children from 2 to 3 and 6 months years old during a two months psychomotor intervention dividing them into a MI and a visual imagery (VI) group respectively, automatically evoking these abilities with short stories. To assess motor, cognitive, social and linguistic development of children we used the “Ages and Stages Questionnaire - Third Edition” (ASQ-3) completed by parents twice in total, before the start of the intervention and immediately after the end. The research will be completed in late April 2015, but we expect a significant improvement in the development of motor and cognitive skills of children who take part in the MI than in the VI condition as evidence of the MI presence also in very young children.