Implicit and Explicit Motor Learning in Children with and without Down's Syndrome.

This paper reports as tudy investigating the degree of dissociation between performance shown by children with or without Down’ ss yndrome (DS), matched on non-verbal MA-level, following an implicit or explicit learning procedure. Ta skspecific factors wer et ightly controlled using the same task for both modes of learning. The implicit learning task was based on the manipulation of ag raphic production principle .O ur procedur et rained participants to reverse the principle .I nt he explicit task, participants had to learn the tw or ules that account for this reversed principle. Whether they wer et rained implicitly or explicitly ,p articipants then performed the same test in which the impact of their training was assessed. Children with DS performed as wel la sc ontrols in the implicit learning condition. They benefited less from the explicit learning condition than controls. They appeare dt ob e impaire di nt he ability to recollect explicit information about the implicit training situation in comparison with controls. These results ar ed iscussed in the light of the current literatur eo nt he implicit and explicit modes of learning, and hypotheses ar e formulated about specific information processes that ma yb ei mpaired in individuals with DS.