The effect of motor and physical activity intervention on motor outcomes of children with autism spectrum disorder: A systematic review

Lay abstract Up to 83% of children with autism spectrum disorder have difficulty performing age-appropriate motor skills. However, the effectiveness of current interventions to improve motor skills is poorly understood. In this review, we examined 34 research studies that investigated the use of interventions to improve the motor abilities of children with autism spectrum disorder. We also examined seven research studies that investigated strategies used to teach children with autism spectrum disorder age-appropriate motor skills. In total, these studies included 1173 children with autism spectrum disorder ranging from the age of 3 to 19 years. We found that many interventions improved the motor abilities of children with autism spectrum disorder including the following: (1) motor activity interventions (e.g. gymnastics, soccer), (2) motor skill interventions (e.g. throwing, catching), (3) horse riding interventions, (4) swimming interventions, (5) video gaming interventions, and (6) physical education interventions. However, each intervention improved different types of motor abilities. We also found that as a teaching strategy, visual instruction was more effective than verbal instruction for children with autism spectrum disorder. In addition, the children with autism spectrum disorder learned equally well from many different types of instructors (adult, robot, or peer). Further high-quality research on this topic is needed to determine how to best optimize the motor abilities of children with autism spectrum disorder.