  The purpose of the present experiment was to investigate whether, with
vision, the magnitude of the effect of calf muscles fatigue on postural control
during bipedal quiet standing depends on the eye-visual target distance. Twelve
young university students were asked to stand upright as immobile as possible
in three visual conditions (No vision, Vision 1m and Vision 4m) executed in two
conditions of No fatigue and Fatigue of the calf muscles. Centre of foot
pressure displacements were recorded using a force platform. Similar increased
variances of the centre of foot pressure displacements were observed in the
fatigue relative to the No fatigue condition for both the No vision and Vision
4m conditions. Interestingly, in the vision 1m condition, fatigue yielded: (1)
a similar increased variance of the centre of foot pressure displacements to
those observed in the No vision and Vision 4m conditions along the
medio-lateral axis and (2) a weaker destabilising effect relative to the No
vision and Vision 4m conditions along the antero-posterior axis. These results
evidence that the ability to use visual information for postural control during
bipedal quiet standing following calf muscles fatigue is dependent on the
eye-visual target distance. More largely, in the context of the multisensory
control of balance, the present findings suggest that the efficiency of the
sensory reweighting of visual sensory cues as the neuro-muscular constraints
acting on the subject change is critically linked with the quality of the
information the visual system obtains.
