Poster #75 - Effects of Virtual Interventions on Motor, Social, and Cognitive Outcomes in Individuals with Developmental Disorders: A Systematic Review.

• In Event: Poster Session 19

Abstract

Background & Objectives:
Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Down Syndrome (DS), Intellectual Disability (ID), Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), and Developmental Coordination Disorder (DCD) have motor impairments that impair their daily functioning, academic performance, social communication, and overall community participation (Bhat, 2021, Bhat et al., 2022). Physical activity (PA) through sport and exercise can positively impact gross motor skills including balance/coordination, social participation, and cognitive skills such as attention/executive functioning (Amonkar et al., 2021; Su et al., 2022).
There is growing research on the use of virtual technologies (e.g., mobile app, Zoom, virtual reality, videogaming, serious games, etc.) to provide remote services such as speech therapy, behavioral therapies, and counseling to individuals with various medical conditions. Yet, the use of virtual technologies to provide movement interventions to individuals with disabilities is a relatively recent area of research. Our systematic review/meta-analysis aims to comprehensively summarize the quantitative and qualitative results of studies to date reporting the efficacy of virtual physical activity programs on multisystem outcomes including motor, social and cognitive skills in individuals with developmental disabilities. We are also specifically interested in assessing differences in the effects of virtual motor interventions in individuals with developmental disabilities with comorbid ID versus those without ID.
Methods:
We searched PubMed (818), PsycInfo (1197), SCOPUS (1394), and CINAHL (852) databases through July 2022. Articles were included if they used virtual technologies to provide physical activity or motor interventions in individuals with developmental disabilities including ASD, ADHD, ID, DCD, and DS. We included studies that assessed effects of virtual motor interventions on all types of outcomes. Studies were excluded if they were case studies, theses/dissertations, or study protocols, included a single session of exercise, involved sedentary activities, provided only qualitative data, did not provide interventions to individuals with disabilities themselves, or did not use virtual interactions for providing movement interventions. Inter-rater reliability of >90% was established on the first 100 abstracts before double coding each abstract across all authors.
Results:
Out of a total of 2682 articles retrieved from databases using our search strategy, a total of 40 articles met our inclusion criteria. We are in the process of coding the 40 articles to obtain information on study characteristics, sample characteristics, intervention characteristics, treatment effects, methodological quality of studies, and effect sizes of reported treatment effects.
Conclusions:
Our review will add to the growing literature on the utility of virtual therapies to improve access to care for individuals with developmental disabilities. Especially in light of the pandemic, virtual interventions have been recognized as a cost-effective and safe modality that helps expand geographic access to families having difficulties accessing face-to-face care. Our review will also shed light on the differential effects of virtual therapies on target outcomes based on the severity of impairment i.e., in individuals with and without accompanying ID. Based on results of our review, we will provide recommendations for clinicians with regard to the use of virtual motor interventions with their clients with developmental disabilities.

Authors

• Jungmei Tsai, University of Delaware
  Presenting Author

• Jacob Corey, University of Delaware

• Ashwin Mhadeshwar, University of Delaware

• Sudha M Srinivasan, University of Connecticut

• Anjana N Bhat, University of Delaware