Exploration of a novel virtual environment improves memory consolidation in ADHD

Abstract

Experimental evidence in rodents and humans suggests that long-term memory consolidation can be enhanced by the exploration of a novel environment presented during a vulnerable early phase of consolidation. This memory enhancing effect (behavioral tagging) is caused by dopaminergic and noradrenergic neuromodulation of hippocampal plasticity processes. In translation from animal to human research, we investigated whether behavioral tagging with novelty can be used to tackle memory problems observed in children and adolescents with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). 34 patients with ADHD and 34 typically developing participants (age 9–15 years) explored either a previously familiarized or a novel virtual environment 45 min after they had learned a list of 20 words. Participants took a free recall test both immediately after learning the word list and after 24 h. Patients who explored a familiar environment showed significantly impaired memory consolidation compared to typically developing peers. Exploration of a novel environment led to significantly better memory consolidation in children and adolescents with ADHD. However, we did not observe a beneficial effect of novel environment exploration in typically developing participants. Our data rather suggested that increased exploration of a novel environment as well as higher feelings of virtual immersion compromised memory performance in typically developing children and adolescents, which was not the case for patients with ADHD. We propose that behavioral tagging with novel virtual environments is a promising candidate to overcome ADHD related memory problems. Moreover, the discrepancy between children and adolescents with and without ADHD suggests that behavioral tagging might only be able to improve memory consolidation for weakly encoded information.

Gaming My Way to Recovery: A Systematic Scoping Review of Digital Game Interventions for Young People's Mental Health Treatment and Promotion

“…This largest category of games for mild to moderate mental health conditions included 16 games evaluated in 24/49 studies (49.0%). Five of the eight youth games were therapeutic games: SPARX ( 76 – 78 , 80 – 83 ) for depression or depression/anxiety, SmartCAT ( 89 , 90 ) for separation, social and general anxiety, Dojo ( 84 ) for anxiety/emotion regulation, Minecraft ( 120 ) for ADHD and What Happened?! ( 98 ) for binge drinking/alcohol use disorder, while two therapeutic games were labeled as adjunct to therapy: Maya ( 101 ) for depressive symptomatology and Pesky gNATs ( 91 , 92 ) [originally called gNATs Island ( 91 )], for low mood, depression or anxiety.…”

“…Processes (RQ1) for the 16 youth studies included: seven RCTs ( 76 – 78 , 83 , 84 , 98 , 108 ), two open trials ( 81 , 89 ), one pre-post game assessment ( 90 ), two qualitative studies ( 80 , 101 ), one multiple case study ( 91 ), one mixed-method study ( 92 ) one study with sequential recall testing ( 120 ) and one secondary data analysis ( 82 ). Barriers to implementation reflected game design issues, including unspecified technical problems in The Journey ( 108 ), lack of personalization in Pesky gNATs ( 91 ) and a suspected lack of cultural fit for SPARX ( 76 ), delivered in a Dutch intervention study.…”

A New Paradigm for Training Hyperactive Dopamine Transporter Knockout Rats: Influence of Novel Stimuli on Object Recognition

“…The DAT-KO rats might have good translational value for developing new treatment principles for mental disorders. As regards ADHD, it was reported that in children and adolescents with ADHD, exploration of a novel environment led to significantly better memory consolidation ( Baumann et al, 2020 ). Data indicate that cognitive training of executive functions is more effective in preschooler children with symptoms of ADHD than in children without any developmental risks ( Scionti et al, 2020 ).…”

“…So far, long-term memory in DAT-KO animals has not been investigated. Since memory improvement in ADHD patients was shown in experiments with novel stimulus presentation ( Baumann et al, 2020 ), this approach is attracting attention to overcome ADHD problems without any medical treatment. The present study focuses on the evaluation of the ability of DAT-KO rats to learn the paradigm of object recognition with rewarded familiar objects and non-rewarded novel objects and store it in long-term memory.…”

A Lean UX Process Model for Virtual Reality Environments Considering ADHD in Pupils at Elementary School in COVID-19 Contingency

“…In his proposal, Yang presents a study in which a series of VR games focused on body coordination training were implemented with the aim of improving the cognitive capacity, abstract reasoning, and complex information processing of children with ADHD. In the case of Baumann et al's [15] proposal, it focuses on presenting virtual reality environments that help the consolidation of long-term memory, bringing benefits to the memory problems observed in children and adolescents with ADHD.…”