[Influence of obesity on postural capacities of teenagers. Preliminary study]. / Effets de l'obésité sur la régulation posturale d'adolescentes. Etude préliminaire.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this work was to define the influence of obesity on static postural control of teenagers. SUBJECTS AND METHOD: Nine obese subjects and seven non-obese subjects were characterised with stabilometric data of surface, of lengths and spontaneous sway in the lateral (X) and antero-posterior (Y) axis with open eyes and closed eyes in two conditions on firm floor and foam floor condition. RESULTS: For length data, significative differences were observed between the two groups for the opened eyes condition (p < 0.02) and eyes closed (p < 0.03) during foam floor condition. CONCLUSION: During experimental solicitations, obesity influences significatively the postural control of teenagers. Instead of systematic statistic differences, we observed a decrease in balance capacities of obese subjects. The effects of fat tissue distributions were not verified.