A pilot study to determine the feasibility of enhancing cognitive abilities in children with sensory processing dysfunction

Abstract

Children with Sensory Processing Dysfunction (SPD) experience incoming information in atypical, distracting ways. Qualitative challenges with attention have been reported in these children, but such difficulties have not been quantified using either behavioral or functional neuroimaging methods. Furthermore, the efficacy of evidence-based cognitive control interventions aimed at enhancing attention in this group has not been tested. Here we present work aimed at characterizing and enhancing attentional abilities for children with SPD. A sample of 38 SPD and 25 typically developing children were tested on behavioral, neural, and parental measures of attention before and after a 4-week iPad-based at-home cognitive remediation program. At baseline, 54% of children with SPD met or exceeded criteria on a parent report measure for inattention/hyperactivity. Significant deficits involving sustained attention, selective attention and goal management were observed only in the subset of SPD children with parent-reported inattention. This subset of children also showed reduced midline frontal theta activity, an electroencephalographic measure of attention. Following the cognitive intervention, only the SPD children with inattention/hyperactivity showed both improvements in midline frontal theta activity and on a parental report of inattention. Notably, 33% of these individuals no longer met the clinical cut-off for inattention, with the parent-reported improvements persisting for 9 months. These findings support the benefit of a targeted attention intervention for a subset of children with SPD, while simultaneously highlighting the importance of having a multifaceted assessment for individuals with neurodevelopmental conditions to optimally personalize treatment.

Closed-Loop Attention Restoration Theory for Virtual Reality-Based Attentional Engagement Enhancement

“…Although this study was conducted in healthy adults only, related work demonstrated that populations with physical and intellectual disabilities can benefit from VR in capturing and maintaining attention [61,62]. Thus, the findings presented here have practical implications for assessing attention-related diseases, including sensory processing dysfunction [63], attention deficit hyperactivity disorder [64], and mild impaired cognition [65] in the context of clinical research. Given that previous work [63][64][65] showed the feasibility of using 2D-based attention assessments and interventions for these diseases, we surmise that the use of a more engaging and enjoyable VR-HMD may indeed follow a similar or even better results.…”

Commercial video games and cognitive functions: video game genres and modulating factors of cognitive enhancement

“…Cognitive trainings, having components of VGs (i.e. adapting the difficulty level based on the performance and instantly providing the feedback) [11], were found to be effective through the individualization of the training (see Table 1). Constant provision of feedback was helpful for self-monitoring of the progress in VGs [12] in that players were able to change their decisions based on the feedback [13].…”

“…The improvement in cognitive functions despite the individual difference in the extent to which the functions were improved [11] Children SPD (N = 10), children SPD+ADHD (N = 17), TDC(N = 20)…”

Current Trends in the Area of Computer Games

“…Populárnost her spočívá především v jejich zábavním charakteru, který umožňuje zprostředkovávat jedincům relaxaci, odreagování či odpoutání od reality a povinností. Nepochybně jsou prokázané pozitivní vlivy počítačových her na kognitivní funkce člověka (Mahmoudi et al, 2015), rozvoj specifických dovedností (Nowakowski, Makarewicz, 2018) nebo při využití počítačových her jako terapeutického nástroje (Anguera et al, 2017), aj. Při nadměrném hraní se ovšem mohou počítačové hry stát potenciálně rizikovou aktivitou, z níž plynou zásadní negativní vlivy na člověka.…”