VIDEOGIOCHI influenze sul comportamento e sul funzionamento psicologico in etagrave di sviluppo

Lrsquoaumento dellrsquouso dei videogiochi (oggi disponibili anche in rete sui cellulari) egrave crescente anche se con variazioni nei diversi paesi e nelle diverse culture (in

Italia fra le attivitagrave preferite 26 fra i 3 e i 5 anni 70 fra i 16 e i 17 anni)

Numerose ricerche hanno indagato gli effetti dei diversi tipi di videogiochi sul funzionamento cognitivo e sui comportamenti sociali di bambini e adolescenti

Vi egrave una forte pressione del mercato per spingere allrsquoacquisto di videogiochi e attrezzature elettroniche

sempre piugrave potenti e complesse

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Numerose ricerche hanno indagato gli effetti dei diversi tipi di videogiochi sul funzionamento cognitivo e sui comportamenti sociali di bambini e adolescenti

Uno dei problemi piugrave dibattuti possibili effetti negativi sul comportamento e sulle prestazioni scolastiche dellrsquoabuso di alcuni tipi di videogiochihellip -  esposizione a videogiochi violenti incrementa

lrsquoattivazione psicologica puograve aumentare il pensiero e il comportamento aggressivo e i conflitti interpersonali (effetti verificati anche in Italia su 571 ragazzi fra i 7 e i 15 anni Milani et al 2012)

-  un uso molte frequente di videogiochi puograve peggiorare il rendimento scolastico (Gentile e Anderson 2003 Jackson et al 2011)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

Lrsquouso di videogiochi violenti sembra poter influenzare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale

W Mattews et al (2011) - 97deg Radiological Society of North America annual meeting 22 maschi tra i 18 e i 29 anni assegnati casualmente a 2 diverse condizioni sperimentali 10 ore di gioco con videogiochi violenti nella 1deg settimana + non gioco nella 2deg settimana oppure gioco con videogioco non violento nella seconda settimana Alla fine della 1deg e della 2deg settimana ai giocatori venivano somministrati due compiti attentivi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Lrsquoaumento dellrsquouso dei videogiochi (oggi disponibili anche in rete sui cellulari) egrave crescente anche se con variazioni nei diversi paesi e nelle diverse culture (in

Italia fra le attivitagrave preferite 26 fra i 3 e i 5 anni 70 fra i 16 e i 17 anni)

Numerose ricerche hanno indagato gli effetti dei diversi tipi di videogiochi sul funzionamento cognitivo e sui comportamenti sociali di bambini e adolescenti

Vi egrave una forte pressione del mercato per spingere allrsquoacquisto di videogiochi e attrezzature elettroniche

sempre piugrave potenti e complesse

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Numerose ricerche hanno indagato gli effetti dei diversi tipi di videogiochi sul funzionamento cognitivo e sui comportamenti sociali di bambini e adolescenti

Uno dei problemi piugrave dibattuti possibili effetti negativi sul comportamento e sulle prestazioni scolastiche dellrsquoabuso di alcuni tipi di videogiochihellip -  esposizione a videogiochi violenti incrementa

lrsquoattivazione psicologica puograve aumentare il pensiero e il comportamento aggressivo e i conflitti interpersonali (effetti verificati anche in Italia su 571 ragazzi fra i 7 e i 15 anni Milani et al 2012)

-  un uso molte frequente di videogiochi puograve peggiorare il rendimento scolastico (Gentile e Anderson 2003 Jackson et al 2011)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

Lrsquouso di videogiochi violenti sembra poter influenzare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale

W Mattews et al (2011) - 97deg Radiological Society of North America annual meeting 22 maschi tra i 18 e i 29 anni assegnati casualmente a 2 diverse condizioni sperimentali 10 ore di gioco con videogiochi violenti nella 1deg settimana + non gioco nella 2deg settimana oppure gioco con videogioco non violento nella seconda settimana Alla fine della 1deg e della 2deg settimana ai giocatori venivano somministrati due compiti attentivi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Numerose ricerche hanno indagato gli effetti dei diversi tipi di videogiochi sul funzionamento cognitivo e sui comportamenti sociali di bambini e adolescenti

Uno dei problemi piugrave dibattuti possibili effetti negativi sul comportamento e sulle prestazioni scolastiche dellrsquoabuso di alcuni tipi di videogiochihellip -  esposizione a videogiochi violenti incrementa

lrsquoattivazione psicologica puograve aumentare il pensiero e il comportamento aggressivo e i conflitti interpersonali (effetti verificati anche in Italia su 571 ragazzi fra i 7 e i 15 anni Milani et al 2012)

-  un uso molte frequente di videogiochi puograve peggiorare il rendimento scolastico (Gentile e Anderson 2003 Jackson et al 2011)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

Lrsquouso di videogiochi violenti sembra poter influenzare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale

W Mattews et al (2011) - 97deg Radiological Society of North America annual meeting 22 maschi tra i 18 e i 29 anni assegnati casualmente a 2 diverse condizioni sperimentali 10 ore di gioco con videogiochi violenti nella 1deg settimana + non gioco nella 2deg settimana oppure gioco con videogioco non violento nella seconda settimana Alla fine della 1deg e della 2deg settimana ai giocatori venivano somministrati due compiti attentivi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Uno dei problemi piugrave dibattuti possibili effetti negativi sul comportamento e sulle prestazioni scolastiche dellrsquoabuso di alcuni tipi di videogiochihellip -  esposizione a videogiochi violenti incrementa

lrsquoattivazione psicologica puograve aumentare il pensiero e il comportamento aggressivo e i conflitti interpersonali (effetti verificati anche in Italia su 571 ragazzi fra i 7 e i 15 anni Milani et al 2012)

-  un uso molte frequente di videogiochi puograve peggiorare il rendimento scolastico (Gentile e Anderson 2003 Jackson et al 2011)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

Lrsquouso di videogiochi violenti sembra poter influenzare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale

W Mattews et al (2011) - 97deg Radiological Society of North America annual meeting 22 maschi tra i 18 e i 29 anni assegnati casualmente a 2 diverse condizioni sperimentali 10 ore di gioco con videogiochi violenti nella 1deg settimana + non gioco nella 2deg settimana oppure gioco con videogioco non violento nella seconda settimana Alla fine della 1deg e della 2deg settimana ai giocatori venivano somministrati due compiti attentivi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Lrsquouso di videogiochi violenti sembra poter influenzare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale

W Mattews et al (2011) - 97deg Radiological Society of North America annual meeting 22 maschi tra i 18 e i 29 anni assegnati casualmente a 2 diverse condizioni sperimentali 10 ore di gioco con videogiochi violenti nella 1deg settimana + non gioco nella 2deg settimana oppure gioco con videogioco non violento nella seconda settimana Alla fine della 1deg e della 2deg settimana ai giocatori venivano somministrati due compiti attentivi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

1313

2 compiti attentivi compiti Stroop modificati -  emotional Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano identificare il

colore delle parole in una lista di parole ldquoemotiverdquo in cui alcune parole erano violente (es ldquohitrdquo) altre non-violente

-  counting Stroop task i partecipanti dovevano contare una serie di parole su di uno schermo di un computer indicanti un numero diverso dal numero degli item

Nel corso dei due test veniva utilizzata una fMRI per rilevare lrsquoattivitagrave cerebrale dei partecipanti

Dopo la prima settimana (esposizione a giochi violenti) i partecipanti mostravano meno attivitagrave nelle aree cerebrali legate ad attivazione emotiva e meno attivitagrave

nelle aree legate a self-controlinibizione13

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Questi effetti possono essere particolarmente intensi per alcuni tipi di videogames

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Lrsquoabuso di videogiochi piugrave inoltre portare a - dipendenza (Dill e Dill 1998)

comportamento compulsivo verso i giochi elettronici sacrificando tempo e denaro a scapito di scuola e attivitagrave sociali

- particolarmente per soggetti predisposti conseguenze fisiche

allucinazioni visive ed uditive dolori articolari epilessia in soggetti fotosensibili (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI NEGATIVI dei videogiochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFE

TTI N

EGAT

IVI d

ei v

ideo

gioc

hi

EFFE

TTI P

OSI

TIVI

dei

vid

eogi

ochi

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

Molti videogiochi specificamente progettati e adeguatamente usati hanno mostrato potenzialitagrave positive

- per incrementare comportamenti socialmente positivi (Bartholow amp Sestir 2010) e anche in soggetti con problemi di sviluppo - per promuovere ed aiutare la formazione di abilitagrave sociali (capacitagrave di negoziare i ruoli comprendere le regole della societagrave)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave so

cial

i

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

-  per facilitare lrsquoautoregolazione sia nellrsquoambito emozionale che in quello cognitivo per esempio nei casi di deficit attentivo e iperattivita (ADHD) (Salonius e Pasternak 2005)

-  per promuovere lrsquoacquisizione o lrsquoincremento di capacitagrave spaziali risoluzione di problemi abilitagrave matematiche per la coordinazione visuo-motoria destrezza manuale tempi di reazione (Dill e Dill 1998)

-  per training abilitagrave cognitive in disturbi dellrsquoapprendimento (es dislessia)

-  per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi A

bilit

agrave co

gniti

ve

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi soggetti che usano piugrave frequentemente alcuni tipi di videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori in abilitagrave implicanti lrsquoelaborazione di scene visive e sequenze rapide di stimoli coloro che li usano meno frequentemente mostrano un aumento di punteggi dopo un esercizio con gli stessi videogiochi anche limitato (Green e Bavelier 2003)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

I videogiochi possono avere effetti positivi nei processi visivi e attentivi

in un compito di numerazione rapida di oggetti presentati a video coloro che usano piugrave frequentemente i videogiochi hanno mostrato prestazioni migliori

Ciograve potrebbe essere dovuto a un processo ldquopreattentivordquo con lrsquoutilizzo di una strategia ldquoautomat icardquo d i scans ione p iugrave ve loce (Riesenhuber 2004)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

Ersquo stato utilizzato un gioco che coinvolge capacitagrave di tipo spaziale al fine di confrontare lrsquoincremento delle abilitagrave spaziali in un gruppo sperimentale che aveva usato quel gioco e in un gruppo di controllo che aveva usato un altro gioco che non coinvolge abilitagrave spaziali

MA

RB

LE M

AD

NES

S

CONJECTURE =

WORD GAME

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

(Subrahmanyam e Greenfield 1994)

61 ragazzi di 11 anni divisi in due gruppi agrave videogioco CON abilitagrave spaziali videogioco SENZA abilitagrave spaziali Test che misura abilitagrave spaziali (Pellegrino et al 1987) PRIMA e DOPO aver giocato per 2h e 45 minuti con i videogiochi uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

uuml  batteria con 10 subtest 5 per abilitagrave spaziali statiche 5 per abilitagrave spaziali dinamiche 3 scale Memory lane riconoscere il percorso di 3 oggetti in movimento Extrapolation riprodurre la traiettoria di un oggetto in movimento Intercept intercettare un oggetto in movimento (UFO) con un altro oggetto in movimento (missile)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Nel post-test si egrave osservata una diminuzione significativa degli errori nel compito di abilitagrave spaziali nei soggetti del primo gruppo (Video Game Group)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi possono avere incrementare processi di organizzazione spaziale dellrsquoinformazione

Miglioramento piugrave m a r c a t o n e i bambini con scarse abilitagrave spaziali

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

2 premessehellip

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Identificare se un quadrato o un rombo compare in uno dei 6 cerchi ignorando lrsquoelemento distrattore -  distrattore compatibile -  distrattore incompatibile

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

Effetto compatibilitagrave tempi di reazione minori nella condizione di compatibilitagrave t ra target e distrat tor i rispetto alla condizione di incompatibilitagrave agrave misura delle risorse attentive

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Es flanker compatibility task

La difficoltagrave del compito egrave stata manipolata variando il n u m e r o d i d i s t r a t t o r i p r e s e n t i n e i 6 c e r c h i (nessuno 1 3 o 5)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Lrsquoeffetto compatibilitagrave decresce allrsquoaumentare

della difficoltagrave del compito per i NVGP (non video game player) ma

non per i VGP (video game player)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 1

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Action video game modifies visualselective attentionC Shawn Green amp Daphne Bavelier

Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences Center for Visual Science Universityof Rochester Rochester New York 14627 USA

As video-game playing has become a ubiquitous activity intodayrsquos society it is worth considering its potential consequenceson perceptual and motor skills It is well known that exposing anorganism to an altered visual environment often results inmodification of the visual system of the organism The field ofperceptual learning provides many examples of training-inducedincreases in performance But perceptual learning when itoccurs tends to be specific to the trained task that is generali-zation to new tasks is rarely found1ndash10 Here we show by contrastthat action-video-game playing is capable of altering a range ofvisual skills Four experiments establish changes in differentaspects of visual attention in habitual video-game players ascompared with non-video-game players In a fifth experimentnon-players trained on an action video game show markedimprovement from their pre-training abilities thereby establish-ing the role of playing in this effectWe first used the flanker compatibility effect a standard exper-

imental paradigm in attentional studies to determine whethervideo-game playing produces an overall increase in attentionalcapacity11 This task measures the effect of a to-be-ignored dis-tractor on a target task The size of this distractor effect has beenproposed to provide an index of lsquoleft-overrsquo attentional resources Inparticular it has been reported12 that the distractor effect is largewhen the target task is easy but small when the target task is madedifficult by increasing the number of filler shapes in the ring (Fig1a) The currently accepted basis for this finding is that when thetarget task is easy spare attentional resources lsquospill overrsquo to thedistractor processing it to some extent and thereby influencingtarget processing As the target task becomes more difficult fewerattentional resources remain to process the extraneous distractorIrrelevant processing is only truly prevented once the target taskbecomes so difficult that all available resources are devoted to thetarget task leaving none to the distractorThis task therefore affords an opportunity to test the hypothesis

that video-game playing increases the capacity of the visual atten-tional system If video-game players (VGPs) do indeed have agreater attentional capacity they should exhaust their visual atten-tion resources more slowly than non-video-game players (NVGPs)as the target task becomes more difficult As predicted by thehypothesis of a greater capacity in their population VGPs showedan overall distractor effect that remained even when the target taskwas difficult (Fig 1b) Thus at difficulty levels where NVGPs havelong depleted their attentional resources VGPs possess sufficientresources to perform the target task with resources still remainingto spill over to the distractors These results indicate that VGPspossess enhanced attentional capacityWe confirmed this increase in capacity more directly through

the use of an enumeration task When asked to report how manysquares are presented in a briefly flashed display normal subjectperformance seems to be best captured by two distinct processesan lsquoautomaticrsquo operation for small numbers of targets in whichperformance is rapid accurate and independent of number(subitizing) and a slower serial counting process for largernumbers of items13 The number of items that can be subitizedgives an estimate of the number of items that can be attended atonce14ndash16 VGPs could subitize more items than NVGPs (49versus 33 items population effect P 001 Fig 2) Thus

video-game playing enhances the number of visual items thatcan be unerringly apprehended

These two experiments indicated that video-game playingenhances attentional capacity in an area well within the lsquotrainingrsquo(video-game playing) zone (0ndash58 from fixation) however it wasunclear whether video-game playing also facilitates processingoutside the training range To test this possibility we comparedthe distribution of visual attention in VGPs and NVGPs at threelocations one well within the training range (108) one at itsboundary (208) and one well outside the training range (308 allVGPs reported playing in a field that extends nomore than 188 fromfixation) We adapted the lsquouseful field of viewrsquo task (refs 17ndash19 andFig 3a) which measures participantsrsquo ability to locate a targetamongst distractors This measure does not correlate well withstandard tests of visual acuity but rather provides a measure ofattentional resources and their spatial distribution17 VGPs faroutperformed NVGPs at all eccentricities (Fig 3b) distractor levelsand distractorndasheccentricity pairs These results indicate an

Figure 1 Measure of attentional resources a Flanker compatibility task Participantswere asked to decide whether a square or a diamond appeared within one of the six rings

(target task) while ignoring a distractor shape presented outside the rings The distractor

shape could be either compatible (the same as the target shape) or incompatible (the

alternative target shape) Of interest was the difference in target processing speed

between compatible and incompatible trials This difference also called the lsquocompatibility

effectrsquo measures the attentional resources available to the participant By inserting no

one three or five extra shapes into the rings the difficulty of the target task was

manipulated to test the possibility that VGPs show compatibility effects at task difficulties

for which attentional resources are usually exhausted in NVGPs b Flanker compatibilityeffect As previously reported12 the compatibility effect (and spare attentional resources)

decreased with task difficulty in NVGPs (task difficulty pound compatibility P 0001) In

VGPs by contrast the compatibility effect remained as the target task was made more

difficult (population pound task difficulty pound compatibility P 0003) As a result VGPs

showed a significantly greater compatibility effect than NVGPs when the target task was

difficult indicating greater attentional resources in VGPs (P 001) Error bars denote

sem

letters to nature

NATURE |VOL 423 | 29 MAY 2003 | wwwnaturecomnature534 copy 2003 Nature Publishing Group

Maggiori risorse attentive nei VGP

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

Premessa 2 Current Biology 22 1ndash6 May 8 2012 ordf2012 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved DOI 101016jcub201203013

ReportA Causal Link between Visual SpatialAttention and Reading Acquisition

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori12 Milena Ruffino2

Katia Pedrolli1 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadova 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology UnitScientific Institute lsquolsquoE Medearsquorsquo Bosisio PariniLecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Reading is a unique cognitive human skill crucial to life inmodern societies but for about 10of the children learningto read is extremely difficult They are affected by a neurode-velopmental disorder called dyslexia [1 2] Although im-paired auditory and speech sound processing is widelyassumed to characterize dyslexic individuals [1ndash5]emerging evidence suggests that dyslexia could arise fromamore basic cross-modal letter-to-speech sound integrationdeficit [6ndash9] Letters have to be precisely selected from irrel-evant and cluttering letters [10 11] by rapid orienting ofvisual attention before the correct letter-to-speech soundintegration applies [12ndash17] Here we ask whether prereadingvisual parietal-attention functioning may explain futurereading emergence and development The present 3 yearlongitudinal study shows that prereading attentional orient-ingmdashassessed by serial search performance and spatialcueing facilitationmdashcaptures future reading acquisitionskills in grades 1 and 2 after controlling for age nonverbalIQ speech-sound processing and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping Our findings provide the first evidence thatvisual spatial attention in preschoolers specifically predictsfuture reading acquisition suggesting new approaches forearly identification and efficient prevention of dyslexia

Results

To test the hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is caus-ally linked to future reading acquisition [13 16] we examinedboth serial search performance [17ndash20] and spatial cueingfacilitation [14 15] in 96 prereader Italian-speaking childrenin kindergarten (T1) Auditory and speech-sound processing(recognition segmentation and blending of syllables) [3ndash5 21]and nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping (rapidautomatized naming RAN of colors) [6 22 23] were alsomeasured in the same prereading sample Their emergingreading skills in grade 1 and the development of the readingskills in grade 2 were measured across the next 2 years ofcompulsory schooling (T2 and T3 respectively) Informedwritten consent was obtained for each child from their parentsand the ethic committee of the lsquolsquoUniversity of Paduarsquorsquo approvedthe research protocol The entire investigation process wasconducted according to the principles expressed in the Decla-ration of Helsinki

The hypothesis that orienting of visual attention is crucial tothe emerging reading abilities [13ndash17 27] predicts that futurefirst grade poor readers already show both poor serial searchand automatic spatial cueing deficit in kindergarten Indepen-dently of any a priori classification of the future readingdisorder if the parietal visual attentional functioning is a neu-rocognitive causal factor of reading acquisition prereadingvisual spatial attention skills in T1 should predict across theentire sample of children future reading emergence in grade1 as well as reading development in grade 2 even if pre-readersrsquo chronological age nonverbal IQ speech-sound pro-cessing [3ndash5 21] and nonalphabetic cross-modal mapping[6ndash8 22 23] are controlled for

Prereading Neurocognitive Deficits in Future PoorReaders Group AnalysisBased on their standardized score in text reading ability [24]children at the end of grade 1 (T2) were divided into twogroups A child was assigned to the poor readers (PR) groupif herhis Z score for averaged fluency and accuracy textreading was below 15 SDs All children who did not meetthe criterion for inclusion in the PR group were assigned tothe normal readers (NR) group The two groups thus obtainedcounted 14 PR and 68 NR with different skills in text readingIn order to control the group-selection reliability we alsoanalyzed group differences for the other reading and phono-logical decoding tasks In grade 1 group differences werefound not only in single word and pseudoword reading butalso in the fluency of letter naming Letter naming is a crucialindex of letter-to-speech sound integration that has beenfound to be impaired in both adults and children with dyslexia[6ndash8] Although letter naming is considered to be one of themost important predictors of subsequent reading acquisition[1] it should be noted that it is strongly influenced bynumerous and partially uncontrolled general factors such asverbal abilities teaching methods and parental input Letternaming is also closely correlated to phonological awareness[22] Thus we investigated letter naming in grade 1 as a basicreadingmeasure rather than a crucial neurocognitive predictorfor future reading developmentInterestingly the two groups differed also in the length effect

of the pseudoword that is an index of a defective serialreading mechanism The two groups of children howeverwere not different for chronological age and nonverbal IQ esti-mated throughout the block design of the Wechsler preschooland primary scale of intelligence [25](see Table S1 availableonline)Prereading Visual Spatial Attention in Future Poor ReadersErrors in the serial visual search task were analyzed by a 23 2mixed analysis of variance (ANOVA) design in which thewithin-subject factor was the spacing between symbols (largeand small see Figure 1A top) and the between-subject factorwas group (PR and NR) The main effect of stimulus spacingwas significant [F(180) = 545 p = 0022 h2 = 0064] showinga crowding effect (the inability to recognize objects in clutter[10 11 14]) Importantly group main effect was also signifi-cant [F(180) = 1224 p = 0001 h2 = 0133] PR made moreerrors than NR (see Figure 1A bottom)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al A Causal Link between Visual Spatial Attention and Reading AcquisitionCurrent Biology (2012) doi101016jcub201203013

Lrsquoattenzione visuo-spaziale misurata nei bambini prescolari predice le future capacitagrave di lettura

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

20 bambini dislessici di 10 anni assegnati testati con un action video game o nonaction video game

Training di 12 ore ndash 9 sessioni da 80 minuti

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Current Biology 23 1ndash5 March 18 2013 ordf2013 Elsevier Ltd All rights reserved httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

ReportAction Video Games MakeDyslexic Children Read Better

Sandro Franceschini13 Simone Gori123 Milena Ruffino2

Simona Viola1 Massimo Molteni2 and Andrea Facoetti1231Developmental and Cognitive Neuroscience LabDepartment of General Psychology University of PaduaPadua 35131 Italy2Developmental Neuropsychology Unit Scientific InstituteE Medea Bosisio Parini Lecco 23842 Italy

Summary

Learning to read is extremely difficult for about 10 of chil-dren they are affected by a neurodevelopmental disordercalled dyslexia [1 2] The neurocognitive causes of dyslexiaare still hotly debated [3ndash12] Dyslexia remediation is farfrom being fully achieved [13] and the current treatmentsdemand high levels of resources [1] Here we demonstratethat only 12 hr of playing action video gamesmdashnot in-volving any direct phonological or orthographic trainingmdashdrastically improve the reading abilities of children withdyslexia We tested reading phonological and attentionalskills in twomatched groups of children with dyslexia beforeand after they played action or nonaction video games fornine sessions of 80 min per day We found that only playingaction video games improved childrenrsquos reading speedwithout any cost in accuracy more so than 1 year of sponta-neous reading development andmore than or equal to highlydemanding traditional reading treatments Attentional skillsalso improved during action video game training It has beendemonstrated that action video games efficiently improveattention abilities [14 15] our results showed that this atten-tion improvement can directly translate into better readingabilities providing a new fast fun remediation of dyslexiathat has theoretical relevance in unveiling the causal roleof attention in reading acquisition

Results

Dyslexia is a severely invalidating learning disability thataffects literacy acquisition despite normal intelligence andadequate instruction [1 2] Dyslexia is often associated withundesirable outcomes such as lower educational attainmentand loss of self-confidence [1 2] because reading is essentialfor all aspects of learning from using older school books to thelatest technology (eg ebooks and smart phones)

Although an impaired auditory discrimination of spokenlanguage (phonological processing) iswidely assumed tochar-acterize dyslexic individuals [1 2 7 8] dyslexia remediation isfar from being fully achieved [1] Improvements in auditory-phonological processingdonotautomatically increase readingabilities [13] Recent evidence suggests that dyslexia couldarise from a basic crossmodal letter-to-speech sound integra-tion deficit [4 5] Remediation based on explicit sys-tematic instruction on letter-to-speech integration (decoding

strategies) appears to be the most efficient treatment[1 2 13] However all the existing treatments are controversialand demand high levels of resources Moreover the cognitiveprocesses underlie the improvements in reading ability remainunclear [1 4]Attentional dysfunction is an important core deficit in

dyslexic individuals [6 9ndash12 16ndash18] Letters must be preciselyselected from among other cluttering graphemes [19] by rapidorientation of visual attention [20] before the correct letter-to-speech sound integration applies [3ndash6 9 17] Efficientattention improves the perception of stimuli [20] and increasesthe development of neural connections [21] between letter andspeech sound [4 5] An attentional deficit reduces the successof traditional dyslexia treatments because learning ability ishampered by spatial and temporal attention dysfunctionThus treatment of attentional deficits could be crucial indyslexia remediationSince video game training has been proven to increase

attention abilities [14 15 22] we investigated the effects ofvideo games on children with dyslexia In contrast to typicalperceptual learning findings in which performance improve-ment for supra- or subliminal features is strictly stimulusspecific [23 24] attentional action video game (AVG) trainingshould produce learning that transfers well beyond the taskdomain [22] It is predicted that AVG training will improveletter-to-speech sound mapping (phonological decoding)and consequently reading abilitiesTo test this hypothesis we measured the phonological

decoding of pseudowords and word text reading skills in 20children with dyslexia before (T1) and after (T2) two videogame trainings Ten dyslexic children were assigned to AVGand ten to nonaction video game (NAVG) training (see theSupplemental Experimental Procedures available online)Chronological age full intelligence quotient (IQ) readingseverity (measured in speed and errors during reading ofword and pseudoword clinical lists) and phonological skillswere similar in the two groups (see Table S1) The two groupsdid not differ at T1 in both reading and attentional measure-ments (all p values gt01) Each child was individually treatedby playing a commercial Wii video game (Rayman RavingRabbids) for a total of 12 hr The single minigames wereselected to create the action and nonaction treatments (seethe Supplemental Experimental Procedures andSupplementalResults) Informed written consent was obtained from theparents of each child and the Scientific Institute E Medeaethic committee approved the research protocol The entireresearch process was conducted according to the principlesexpressed in the Declaration of Helsinki

Reading ImprovementsThe reading inefficiency was measured as a ratio betweenspeed (defined as the time in seconds necessary to readthe specific item depending of the task) and accuracy(defined as the ratio between the correct response and thetotal number of items) This measure was chosen to controlfor the tradeoff between reading speed and accuracyTraining-related changes in reading inefficiency were analyzedby a 2 (task pseudoword decoding and word text reading)

3These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence andreafacoettiunipdit

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Training con action video game - migliora abilitagrave attentive (attenzione spaziale e temporale) - migliora abilitagrave di lettura (velocitagrave e accuratezza)

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili come training per abilitagrave attentive nella dislessia

Es sistema di allerta (differenza tra i due SOA 50 ms e 100 ms) diventa piugrave efficiente in AVG

AVG players have faster response times without a loss ofaccuracy [25]

Relationship between Attentional and ReadingImprovementsThe improvements in spatial and temporal attention correlatedwith those in general reading abilities (r = 052 p = 002 andr = 049 p = 003 respectively) To determine the predictiverelationships between attentional and reading improvementswe performed a three-step fixed-entry multiple regressionanalysis on the entire sample of children with dyslexia(n = 20) The dependent variablewas the general reading abilityimprovements and the predictors were (1) age and full IQ (2)phonological changes and (3) spatial and temporal attention

improvements (for details see Table S5) The attentionalenhancements accounted for about 50 of the unique vari-ance of reading improvement (r2 change = 048 p = 001 seeTable S6) demonstrating a clear causal link between atten-tional functioning and reading remediation AVG training coulddirectly reduce reading disorders in children with dyslexiaincreasing the efficiency of their attentional orienting [14 1522 25] and alerting systems [28]

Discussion

Previous studies have suggested that visual attention could becrucial for learning letter identities and their relative positions(orthographic processing) independently of language knowl-edge [6 10 12 29] In agreement with our causal resultsstudies have shown that visual attention is impaired not onlyin dyslexic children [16 17] but also in prereaders at familialrisk for dyslexia [18] indicating that attentional disorders arepresent before reading acquisition In addition a recent longi-tudinal study demonstrated that prereading visual attentionpredicts future reading acquisition skills in second gradecontrolling not only for age IQ and phonological processingbut also for nonalphabetic visual-to-phonological mapping[10] About 60 of future poor readers displayed visual atten-tion deficits as prereaders [10] The importance of the visualattention and the phonological factors could vary acrosslanguages based on their orthographic transparency degreeHowever visual attention deficit in dyslexia was found inboth consistent and inconsistent orthographies [30ndash36]Accordingly extra-large spacing between letters improvesreading efficiency in dyslexic children with consistent andinconsistent orthographies [11] helping to focus attention[37] on each successive letter within a written word [3]Since all AVGs share an extraordinary speed in terms of

transient events and moving objects a high degree of percep-tual and motor load and an emphasis on peripheral pro-cessing AVG training might mainly improve the efficiency ofthe magnocellular-dorsal pathway or lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream [6 912 17] Although further studies are necessary to investigatethe specific role of the lsquolsquoactionrsquorsquo stream in reading acquisitionour results demonstrate the causal role of visual spatial andcrossmodal temporal attention in dyslexiaOur findingsmdashsupported by results showing that attention

can be studied [38] and efficiently trained [39] duringinfancymdashpave the way for low-resource-demanding early pre-vention programs that could drastically reduce the incidenceof reading disorders

Supplemental Information

Supplemental Information includes seven tables and SupplementalExperimental Procedures and can be found with this article online athttpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

Acknowledgments

We thank Elena Olgiati for help in collecting data This work was funded withgrants from theCARIPARO Foundation (Borse di Dottorato CARIPARO 2009to SF Progetti di Eccellenza CARIPARO 2011ndash2012 to AF) and theUniversity of Padua (Assegni di Ricerca 2009 and 2011 and SeniorResearcher to SG Progetto di Ateneo 2009 and 2011 to AF)

Received November 7 2012Revised January 4 2013Accepted January 15 2013Published February 28 2013

A

B C

Figure 3 Crossmodal Temporal Attention Task and Results

An auditory spatial-temporal cue was presented in the left right or bothloudspeakers placed on either side of the screen A dog appearing in oneof the two circles was the target stimulus Children had to press one oftwo buttons on the keyboard to indicate whether the target appeared inthe left or the right circle (A) Crossmodal temporal attention improvementsrefer to the improvements between T1 and T2 in the reaction time needed tocorrectly localize the target at second cue-target interval (100 ms) incomparison to the first cue-target interval (50 ms) AVG players showeda significant improvement in temporal attention compared to NAVG players(B) Temporal attention (reaction time difference between second and firstcue-target interval) is showed before (T1) and after (T2) training in theNAVG and AVG groups (C) Temporal attention was significantly increasedonly in AVG players The two groups did not differ at T1 significant differ-ence Error bars represent the SE See also Tables S4ndashS6

Current Biology Vol 23 No 64

Please cite this article in press as Franceschini et al Action Video Games Make Dyslexic Children Read Better Current Biology(2013) httpdxdoiorg101016jcub201301044

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Si diffonde nellrsquoultimo decennio la ricerca e la sperimentazione sul DGBL (Digital Game-Based Learning)

Utilizzo dei videogiochi digitali con obiettivi educativi

Il videogioco diventa uno strumento che potenzia e sostiene i processi di apprendimento

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

Esempio di DGBL

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

EFFETTI POSITIVI dei videogiochi

I videogiochi sono utili per favorire e sostenere lrsquoapprendimento

Esempio di DGBL

Tipodigioco Esempidigioco Valoreeducativo

Azione

Violenti Counter Strike Call of DutyBattlefield Tomb Rider 1942 AmericarsquosArmy Brothers in Arms Gears of WarCallout3

Non violenti Mirrors Edge Super MarioBros ReͲMission Need for Speed MarioGalaxyPacͲManAsteroids

Pianificazione delle risorse abilitagravespazialieimmersione

GiocodiruoloFable Dragon Age Origins Dragon Age 2Neverwinter Nights The Elder ScrollsBaldursGate

Cooperazione e gestione dellerisorse Pensiero strategicoproblemsolving

Avventura

Braid Portal Monkey Island ManiacMansion Zelda Indigo Prophecy HeavyRainKingrsquosQuestSpyroCallout3

Raccontare storie incoraggiarelrsquoesplorazione il problem solving ela creazione di legami tra diversiconcetti

StrategiaCivilization LemmingsStarcraft2SupremeCommander Age of Empires Dune IIWarcraftCommandandConquer

Problem solving pianificazione comprendionedi regole complessericreareeventistorici

Simulazione

The Sims Sim City Angry Birds Ǣ ǡ Ǣ Ǧͳ ǡ ǦʹǡǦǡ

Vivere in mondi virtuali esplorazione e riscontro teorico osservazionedelle interazioniedeilororisultatisullrsquoambiente

CombattimentoeSport

Fifa Soccer Saga Pro Evolution SoccerNBALiveTekken(saga)StreetFighter(saga)

Giocodisquadraeserciziosportivo coordinazione mano ndash occhi esviluppodeiriflessi

ǦͳͶǦ

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa

In generale si puograve affermare che le influenze dei videogiochi sullo sviluppo psicologico dipendono da molteplici fattori - Quali videogiochi vengono usati e per quale fine - La quantitagrave di tempo che bambini e adolescenti vi dedicano - I contesti della fruizione (casa scuola locali esterni) - Le interazioni con tutti gli altri fattori socioculturali (per es il livello culturale della famiglia) - Fattori come lrsquoetagrave e lo sviluppo cognitivo di chi li usa