OBJECTIVE: To assess postural stability, specifically center of body sway during single-leg standing balance, among individuals with and without forward head posture (FHP) during smartphone use.
METHODS: The research recruited 53 healthy smartphone users, aged 18-25, and categorized them into FHP group comprising 26 subjects and the normal (control) group with 27 subjects. Participants were assigned the task of maintaining balance while engaged in smartphone typing during single-leg standing. The experiment involved four specific conditions according to neck posture and stable of surface. The study meticulously quantified body center of pressure (COP) sway amplitudes using the Nintendo Wii Balance Board.
RESULTS: The research revealed that individuals with FHP exhibited significantly greater body sway compared to the control group when using smartphones. Notably, distinct variations were observed in path length sway, anteroposterior (AP), and mediolateral (ML) sway amplitude, particularly evident when maintaining flexed neck positions on a soft surface while engaged with smartphones.
CONCLUSIONS: These findings strongly suggest that individuals with FHP encounter deteriorated postural stability during smartphone use, particularly in challenging head positions.

Background: This study investigates the relationship between malocclusion and body posture, head posture, podal system, and gait parameters in children. Methods: A systematic review of observational studies from 2010 to 2023 was conducted and 24 cross-sectional studies involving 6199 participants were identified. These studies were categorized into those dealing with body posture (10 studies, 3601 participants), cervical vertebral column and head posture (6 studies, 644 participants), the podal system (5 studies, 1118 participants), and gait (3 studies, 836 participants). Results: Evidence suggests a significant association between malocclusion and body posture, balance, podal system, and gait parameters. Notably, eight studies found a significant relationship between malocclusion and body posture, while five studies identified this relationship with the cervical vertebral column and head posture, five with the podal system, and three with gait parameters. Conclusions: Overall, the quality of evidence was strong for the association between malocclusion and body posture and the podal system and moderate for head posture and gait parameters. These findings offer insights for therapists to design interventions tailored to children with malocclusion based on considerations of body posture, head posture, podal system, and gait parameters, though further longitudinal cohort studies are needed for better predictive understanding.

UNASSIGNED: Head posture deviation is seen in 52.5 % of children aged 6-15 years. Studies have shown that poor posture habits can impair muscle function during craniofacial growth and development. A muscle imbalance causes abnormal positioning of dental and skeletal structures, a condition that exerts negative impacts, such as changes in facial morphology.
UNASSIGNED: To determine through photometric analysis the relationship between craniovertebral angle as a function of head posture and glabella-subnasale-pogonion (G-Sn-Pg) angle as a function of facial profile in 10-12-year-old children, and the results will help to avoid facial development issues.
UNASSIGNED: Thirty-three subjects met the inclusion criteria. Their craniovertebral angles and facial profiles were measured using lateral photometry and ImageJ. The craniovertebral angle was determined by connecting the tragus and C7 with a horizontal line, whereas the facial profile angle was determined by connecting the glabella, subnasale, and pogonion. The relationship between the craniovertebral and G-Sn-Pg angle values was analyzed using the Pearson correlation test.
UNASSIGNED: A significant relationship was observed between the craniovertebral angle and the G-Sn- Pg angle (p < 0.05), although such a relationship was weak (r = 0.373).
UNASSIGNED: A more forward head posture is associated with a more convex facial profile, and this relationship is useful for the early prevention and treatment.

BACKGROUND: Cell phone usage is highly prevalent among young adults. They are used for multiple purposes including communication, studies, social networking and entertainment. However, its excessive usage has been associated with adverse health outcomes.
OBJECTIVE: The objective was to find the association of cell phone usage with musculoskeletal discomfort (MSD) and its associated factors.
METHODS: A cross-sectional study was conducted on young adult students from a low-middle income country over a period of 3 months from December 2018 to February 2019. A structured questionnaire based on the Disabilities of the Arm, Shoulder and Hand (QuickDASH scoring) was used to record the musculoskeletal discomfort.
RESULTS: Out of 803 questionnaires, data of 754 (94%) were entered and the remaining questionnaires (n = 49) were discarded due to incomplete answers. The mean age was 20.83 (1.62) years. In our study, there were 194 (25.7%) males and 560 (74.3%) female participants. Neck and shoulder were the most frequently affected regions. A significant difference in QuickDASH score was observed between genders (p-value p ≤ 0.001). Left-handed individuals scored significantly higher on QuickDASH score compared to right-handed individuals (p < 0.05). Increased musculoskeletal discomfort was reported by individuals with daily cell phone use of more than four hours (p < 0.05). A positive significant correlation was found between continuous one hour cell-phone use and higher mean QuickDASH scores (correlation coefficient 0.124, p value 0.001). Shorter eye-to-screen distance was significantly associated with MSD (p < 0.05).
CONCLUSIONS: Musculoskeletal discomfort is associated with the female gender, duration of cell phone use and a small eye-to-screen distance.

BACKGROUND: Coordination between the trunk and head is considered important for walking stability. Recent studies have reported that wearing complete dentures could improve trunk stability during walking; however, its effect on the head has not been clarified.
OBJECTIVE: This study aimed to clarify the effect of complete dentures on head stability during walking in edentulous older adults.
METHODS: Twenty edentulous older adults (11 men and 9 women; mean age, 78.6 ± 5.8 years) who used complete dentures were included in the study. Acceleration and angle rate sensors were placed on the participants\' brow, chin and waist, and they were asked to walk a 20-m passage under two conditions: with and without dentures. The outcomes used to assess head stability were the variance values of acceleration and angle rate, the peak-to-peak values, harmonic ratio, root mean square, integrated values of the difference and dynamic time warping data obtained from the sensors. The variance values of the brow acceleration were compared using a paired t-test, and other outcomes were compared using a Wilcoxon signed-rank test. All significance levels were set at 5%.
RESULTS: In acceleration without dentures, the variance values of the chin and the peak-to-peak values of the brow and chin were significantly larger than with dentures. Angle rate without dentures, the variance values and the peak-to-peak values of the brow and chin were also significantly larger than with dentures.
CONCLUSIONS: Wearing complete dentures while walking might improve head stability and contribute to walking stability in edentulous older adults.

The monitoring of head posture is crucial for interactive learning, in order to build feedback with learners\' attention, especially in the explosion of digital teaching that occurred during the current COVID-19 pandemic. However, conventional monitoring based on computer vision remains a great challenge in the multi-freedom estimation of head posture, owing to low-angle annotation and limited training accuracy. Here, we report a fully integrated attachable inertial device (AID) that comfortably monitors in situ head posture at the neck, and provides a machine learning-based assessment of attention. The device consists of a stretchable inertial sensing unit and a fully integrated circuit-based system, as well as mechanically compliant encapsulation. Due to the mechanical flexibility, the device can be seamlessly attach to a human neck\'s epidermis without frequent user interactions, and wirelessly supports six-axial inertial measurements, thereby obtaining multidimensional tracking of individual posture. These head postures (40 types) are then divided into 10 rotation actions which correspond to diverse situations that usually occur in daily activities of teaching. Benefiting from a 2D convolutional neural network (CNN)-based machine learning model, their classification and prediction of head postures can be used to analyze and infer attention behavior. The results show that the proposed 2D CNN-based machine learning method can effectively distinguish the head motion posture, with a high accuracy of 98.00%, and three actual postures were successfully verified and evaluated in a predefined attention model. The inertial monitoring and attention evaluation based on attachable devices and machine learning will have potential in terms of learning feedback and planning for learners.

BACKGROUND: Edentulism is a debilitating and irreversible condition. It is often accompanied by compromises in the surrounding joint\'s range of motion and changes in the posture of the head. The natural head position is maintained by a balanced tension between cranio-cervical bones, myofacial structures and the dental occlusion. Loss of teeth may cause changes in the head posture that may disturb the patency of the spinal cord and lead to the loss of postural balance. Therefore, this study aimed at evaluating the head posture in the edentulous subjects before and after prosthetic rehabilitation.
METHODS: A total of 16 completely edentulous subjects were selected for the study. Removable complete denture prosthesis was fabricated for all the subjects. Lateral photographs were taken at different time intervals i.e., pre-rehabilitation, 30 minutes, 2 days and 30 days post-rehabilitation. The cranio-vertical angle obtained was digitally calculated using Kinovea software and the results obtained were statistically analysed.
RESULTS: The paired-sample t-test and repeated measures analysis of variance showed an increase in the cranio-vertical angulation of edentulous subjects after rehabilitation, indicating a mild extension of the head.
CONCLUSIONS: The insertion of prosthesis leads to a mild extension of the head. Hence, rehabilitation with a removable prosthesis has a positive effect on the head posture and could therefore aid in maintaining a stable head posture.

Previous research has tested whether culture moderates the relationship between head tilt and perceptions of a cooperation-relevant construct. In this paper, we replicated the effects of head posture on perceived traits and compared Chinese and American participants to explore whether difference in cultural background (collectivist and individualist) affects perceptual attribution. Specifically, we investigated how head posture (level, up or down) affects perceptions of cooperativeness. In Experiment 1, Chinese and American participants rated Asian and Caucasian faces in three postures for perceived cooperativeness on a seven-point Likert scale. In Experiment 2, participants ranked the cooperativeness of the three postures of the same faces. In Experiment 3, participants scrolled through face images and manually manipulated vertical head angle to maximise apparent cooperativeness. We found that for both Chinese and American participants a neutral head level posture was perceived as more cooperative than head up and down postures. The optimal head posture for maximised apparent cooperativeness was close to level but with a slight downward rotation. While there was cross-cultural consistency in perceptions, Chinese participants exhibited greater sensitivity to postural cues in their judgments of cooperation compared to American participants. Our results suggest a profound effect of posture on the perception of cooperativeness that is common across cultures and that there are additional subtle cross-cultural differences in the cues to cooperativeness.

UNASSIGNED: This study aims to investigate how exercise programs not directly applied to the cervical spine affect office workers with forward head posture (FHP).
UNASSIGNED: Between March 2018 and June 2018, a total of 32 office workers with FHP (13 males, 19 females; mean age 36.63 years; range, 23 to 57 years) were randomized either to experimental (n=16) or control groups (n=16). Scapular stabilization and thoracic extension exercises were applied to the experimental group and cervical stabilization and stretching exercises to the control group. The results of the pre-intervention and after six weeks measurement of the craniovertebral angle (CVA), respiration, pain, and disability were compared and analyzed.
UNASSIGNED: For intra-group comparison, both groups showed significant differences (p<0.05) in CVA, forced expiratory volume at 1 sec (FEV1), Visual Analog Scale (VAS), and neck disability index at pre- and post-intervention, while only the experimental group showed a significant difference (p<0.05) in maximum inspiratory pressure, maximum expiratory pressure, and forced vital capacity. For inter-group comparison, a significant difference (p<0.05) between FEV1 and VAS was observed.
UNASSIGNED: The combination of scapular stabilization and thoracic extension exercises, not directly applied to the cervical spine, has an effect on improving the posture, respiration, neck pain, and disability in office workers with FHP.