Aging Clinical and Experimental Research
Acute effects of exergames on cognitive function of institutionalized older persons: a single-blinded, randomized and controlled pilot study
Acute effects of exergames on cognitive function of institutionalized older persons: a single-blinded, randomized and controlled pilot study
Sammendrag på engelsk (abstract)
Improvements
on balance, gait and cognition are some of the benefits of exergames. Few
studies have investigated the cognitive effects of exergames in
institutionalized older persons.
To assess the acute effect of a single session of exergames on cognition of
institutionalized older persons.
Nineteen institutionalized older persons were randomly allocated to Wii (WG, n = 10,
86 ± 7 year, two males) or control groups (CG, n = 9,
86 ± 5 year, one male). The WG performed six exercises with
virtual reality, whereas CG performed six exercises without virtual reality.
Verbal fluency test (VFT), digit span forward and digit span backward were used
to evaluate semantic memory/executive function, short-term memory and work
memory, respectively, before and after exergames and Δ post- to pre-session
(absolute) and Δ % (relative) were calculated. Parametric (t
independent test) and nonparametric (Mann–Whitney test) statistics and effect
size were applied to tests for efficacy.
VFT was statistically significant within WG (−3.07, df = 9, p = 0.013).
We found no statistically significant differences between the two groups (p > 0.05).
Effect size between groups of Δ % (median = 21 %) showed
moderate effect for WG (0.63).
Our data show moderate improvement of semantic memory/executive function due to
exergames session. It is possible that cognitive brain areas are activated
during exergames, increasing clinical response.
A single session of exergames showed no significant improvement in short-term
memory, working memory and semantic memory/executive function. The effect size
for verbal fluency was promising, and future studies on this issue should be
developed.
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Aging Clinical and Experimental Research, 2016