Cultural Variation in Physical Development of Childhood

Although infants' acquisition of motor skills is primarily a function of maturation, cross-cultural research on early motor development shows that it can be influenced to some degree by environmental factors.  However, this cultural variance only effects the rate in the emergence of basic motor skills in early motor development.  In other words, accelerated or slowed early motor development can be seen across cultures, but the order of early developmental norms remains constant.