The influence of environmental sounds on walking integrity in older adults

To examine the role of environmental sounds upon walking among older people, information will be gained via a wearable motion detection device, to assess various components (e.g. gait, pace and direction) in response to a variety of environmental sounds (e.g. loudness, cadence, change and volume). This will provide understanding of how components of walking are influenced by the brain's automatic response to noise perturbation in real time. In addition, computer and EEG (electroencephalographic) tests will be used to capture automatic and volitional attentional shifts in response to sound stimuli. This will allow how individual differences may influence detrimental susceptibility to environmental sound to be determined.