The game also has benefits! Action video games can improve your child's reading skills

Reading requires the use of basic mechanisms that are not usually noticed, such as having to know how to move our eyes around the page, or how to use our memories to connect words into a coherent sentence. Recently, studies have shown that these reading skills, such as visual, attention deployment, memory and cognitive flexibility, can be improved by playing action video games.

The research team designed an action video game that combines action games with mini-games that train different executive functions, such as working memory, inhibition, and cognitive flexibility, which are invoked during reading. The universe of this game is an alternate world where children must perform different missions accompanied by a flying creature Raku to save the planet and make progress in the game. The study reproduced components of action games, but did not include violence so that it was suitable for children to play.

The scientists, along with 150 Italian children aged 8 to 12, then split into two groups: the first group played a video game developed by the team, and the second group played Scratch, a game that taught children how to code.

Both games require attention control and execution skills, but in different ways. Action video games require children to complete tasks within a certain amount of time, such as memorizing a series of symbols or reacting only when Raku makes a specific sound, while increasing the difficulty of these tasks based on the child's performance.

Scratch games require planning, reasoning, and problem solving. Children must manipulate objects and logical structures to establish the required programming sequence.

First, the study tested children's ability to read words, non-words, and paragraphs, and a attention test was conducted to measure children's attention control. The children then trained for six weeks, two hours a week, in action video games or control games under the supervision of the school. Your child is tested at school by a clinician at the Observational Diagnostic and Educational Laboratory (UNITN).

The researchers found that children who played action video games had 7 times more attention control compared to the control group. More notably, significant improvements in their reading ability were also observed, not only in terms of reading speed, but also in terms of accuracy, while there was no improvement in the control group.

In addition, the study underwent three further assessment tests at 6, 12, and 18 months after training. Each time, children trained in action games performed better than the control group, proving that these improvements were sustained. In addition, over time, the Italian language performance of the trained children improved significantly, showing a benign improvement in learning ability.

A research paper titled Endacing Reading Skills through a Video Game Mixing Action Mechanics and Cognitive Training was published in Nature-Human Behavior.

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