ADHD
Can preschool games improve ADHD symptoms and focus?
Open access · cc by · source: Europe PMC
Preschoolers showing ADHD symptoms improved their attention and impulse control after a school-based cognitive training program, although teacher-rated symptoms also decreased in the control group.
How this study connects
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Targeted, play-based or structured cognitive training programs in preschool settings can significantly improve impulse control and attention, particularly for children exhibiting ADHD symptoms.
Evidence for the claim as stated.
Study at a glance
- Design
- RCT — 17 one-hour kindergarten sessions on attention, inhibition, and WM vs school-as-usual, in ADHD-symptom and typically developing children
- N
- N=52 · 26 preschoolers with ADHD symptoms and 26 typically developing; 13 of each trained
- Population
- Italian kindergarteners with teacher-rated ADHD symptoms (no formal diagnosis) and typically developing classmates
- Outcome
- Stop-signal attention/inhibition and matching-figures errors after EF training vs control
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Inspect source passages
Can preschool games improve ADHD symptoms and focus?
These passages occur verbatim in the stored paper text. They support the points listed below; they do not verify every statement in the explanation.
26 children with ADHD symptoms participated in the study
The sample consisted of 26 children attending their last year of pre-school (kindergarten) and who exhibited ADHD symptoms but without a diagnosis, due to the fact the Italian guidelines on ADHD suggest to avoid the complete assessment and the diagnosis before six.
26 typically developing children were selected to participate alongside the ADHD group
Therefore, we individuated 26 TD children; of these 13 (five boys and eight girls, mean age = 65.15, SD = 4.498) were randomly assigned to the training condition and 13 to the non-training condition (six boys and seven girls, mean age = 65.61, SD = 4.21).
Key findings
Children with ADHD symptoms who received the training showed significant improvements in their attention and impulse control on the stop-signal frog task and made fewer errors on the matching figures test. However, both the training and control groups showed similar reductions in ADHD symptoms according to teacher ratings, suggesting some improvements were due to standard school activities or developmental maturation. Typically developing children who completed the training also showed modest improvements in their working memory and attention task performance.
Methodology
Researchers evaluated a group-based cognitive training program for 26 Italian preschoolers exhibiting ADHD symptoms and 26 typically developing children. Specifically, 13 children with ADHD symptoms and 13 typically developing children participated in 17 one-hour training sessions distributed over a 9-week period focused on attention, inhibition, and working memory, while the remaining children served as controls. The researchers measured performance before and after the training using a stop-signal frog task, a working memory task, and a figure matching test, alongside teacher rating scales.
Limitations
The study does not prove long-term benefits because there was no long-term follow-up assessment of the children. It also cannot rule out teacher bias, as teachers were aware of which children were assigned to the training group, which may have influenced their behavior ratings. Furthermore, due to school constraints, the researchers used different supplementary cognitive tests in different schools, and the study's small sample size limits the generalizability of its findings.
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