Serious Games as a Complementary Tool for Social Skill Development in Young People: A Systematic Review of the Literature

2021 ◽  
pp. 104687812110312
Author(s):  
Lucy R. Zheng ◽  
Catherine M. Oberle ◽  
W. A. Hawkes-Robinson ◽  
Stéphane Daniau

Background The use of games for social skill development in the classroom is accelerating at a tremendous rate. At the same time, the research surrounding games designed for teaching social skills remains fragmented. This systematic review summarizes the current existing literature on social skill serious games for young people ages 5 to 19 and is the first review of serious games to note the demographic and geographic component of these studies. Method This review included papers that: evaluated a game designed to teach social skills; included measurable, quantitative outcomes; have a translation or be published in English; were peer-reviewed; date from January 2010 to May 2020; and have a nonclinical study population between ages of 5 to 19. Keywords were obtained from the CASEL 5 framework. Results Our findings are mixed but suggest that serious games may improve social skills when used alongside in-person discussion. We also found potential effects of the length of time of gameplay, intervention, and follow-up on social skill serious game effectiveness. Although this review found promising research conducted in East Asian countries and with minority samples in the United States, the majority of social skill serious game research takes place in the United States and Australia, with unreported demographic information and white-majority samples. Conclusions Due to the limited number of published studies in this area and studies lacking methodological rigor, the effectiveness of using games to teach social skills and the impact of background on social skill learning require further discussion.

2011 ◽  
Vol 105 (12) ◽  
pp. 1852-1860 ◽  
Author(s):  
Larry L. Howard

Recent findings indicate that household food insecurity affects children's social skill development in the early years of elementary school. It is important to assess the persistency of developmental consequences and investigate whether all categories of social skills are equally affected by food insecurity experiences. The present paper estimates population-averaged and subject-specific models for children's social skill scores reported by school teachers using longitudinal data on 2310 boys and 2400 girls in the USA enrolled in the 1st (aged 6–9 years), 3rd (aged 8–11 years) and 5th (aged 10–13 years) grades (1999–2003) from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study-Kindergarten. The main findings are, first, significantly (P < 0·05) negative, contemporaneous and transitional relationships between food insecurity experiences and children's social skill scores are evident. Estimates based on sex-stratified samples indicate that the contemporaneous association is strongest among girls, while the association of an early transition from food insecurity in the 1st grade to food security in the 3rd grade is strongest among boys. Second, food insecurity experiences predict children's social skill scores emphasising self-control, attentiveness and task persistence, rather than interpersonal relationships or externalising behaviour. Overall, the findings underscore the multifaceted effect that household food insecurity has on children's social skills and provide the strongest empirical evidence to date that the experiences are linked with non-nutritional developmental consequences for children over a time horizon spanning several years.


2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 414 ◽  
Author(s):  
Emine Kıvanç Öztuğ ◽  
Melek Çiner

<p><strong>Abstract</strong></p><p>Compared to a child who plays basic games, it is seen that children who play exploratory games develop further. Social development is a process with wide spectrum which extends from babyhood to old age. Creative drama activities provide opportunities for thinking critically, learning, social interaction skills, social development and social change and allows for the development of skills within group. For this reason, creative drama is believed to be the most important tool to be used in the supporting of social skill development of children in early childhood with its game-like processes, child-centred construct, urging the child to imagine and providing freedom to the child within certain limits, as well as its employment of games as sub-dimension. In the study, single group pre-test / post-test model which is an experimental research pattern was used in order to identify the impact of creative drama education on social skills of students. Prior to the data collection process permission was granted from the parents and Hasan Avcıoğlu’s Social Skills Evaluation Scale for 4-6 Age groups was used for data collection. The study involved in total 22 children from ages 4 and 5 with equal number of children within each group. Within the framework of social skills evaluation scale, 13 creative drama workshops were prepared each of which were 55 minutes long and the opinion of a field expert was sought. When the scores obtained from the research by the students are examined, it is seen that the mean score from the entire scale before training was 3,41±0,57 whereas the mean score after training increased to 3,68±0,72. It was found out that the difference between the scores obtained by children covered in the study before and after the training was statistically significant (p&lt;0,05). These findings suggest that the study had significantly positive impact on the creative drama-based social skill education and social skill development of children, especially in terms of peer pressure, self-expression, listening and task-completion skills.</p><p> </p><p><strong>Öz</strong></p><p>Yapılandırılmış, merak uyandıran, yeni deneyimleri deneyimleme fırsatı sunan oyunlar, çocukların merak duygusunu canlı tutmakla beraber, gelişimsel açıdan da onları daha ileriye taşır. Düşünme, sorgulama problem çözme gibi davranışları desteklerken, bilişsel ve sosyal açıdan da çocukları aktif hale getirir. Sosyalleşme doğum anından itibaren hayatın içerisine giren ve ömür boyu devam eden bir süreçtir. Bu nedenle her yaş ve koşulda sosyal becerilerin desteklenmesi oldukça önemlidir. Sosyalliğe ilk adım aile ile başlamakta; ardından okulöncesi eğitimle başka bir boyut kazanmaktadır.Yaratıcı drama etkinlikleri, eleştirel düşünme, sosyal etkileşim becerilerini öğrenme, sosyal değişim ve sosyal gelişme katkı koyarak grup içerisinde kişilerin becerilerin geliştirilmesini sağlamaktadır.  Bu nedenle yaratıcı drama; oyunsu süreçleri, çocuğu merkeze alarak yapılandrılması, çocuğu hayal kurmaya ve belirli sınırlar içerisinde özgürlüğün çocuğun elinde olması bunun yanı sıra alt boyutu olarak oyunun kullanılması erken çocukluk dönemindeki çocukların sosyal beceri gelişiminin desteklenmesinde kullanılabilecek en önemli araç olduğu düşünülmektedir. Araştırmada yaratıcı drama eğitiminin çocukların sosyal becerilerine etkisini   tespit etmek amacıyla deneysel araştırma desenleriden tek grupla uygulanan ön test-son test modeli kullanılmıştır. Güzelyurt bölgesinde yer alan özel okulöncesi eğitim merkezine devam eden 4-6 yaş arası çocukların ailelerinden okul yönetimi adına izin alınarak Hasan Avcıoğlu’nun 4-6 yaş Sosyal Beceri Değerlendirme Ölçeği uygulanmıştır. Ölçeğin genel çerçevesinde her biri 55 dakikalık 4 yaş grubundan 11, 5 yaş grubudan 11 çocuk olmak üzere toplam 22 çocuk için 13 yaratıcı drama atölyesi hazırlanmış ve alan uzmanının görüşü alınmıştır. Araştırma kapsamına alınan çocukların Sosyal Becerileri Değerlendirme Ölçeği genelinden aldıkları puanlar incelendiğinde, çocukların ölçek genelinden eğitim öncesi puan ortalaması 3,41±0,57 iken, eğitim sonrası ortalama puan 3,68±0,72’ye çıkmıştır. Araştırmaya katılan çocukların ölçek genelinden eğitim öncesi ve eğitim sonrası elde ettikleri puanlar arasındaki fark istatistiksel olarak anlamlı bulunmuştur (p&lt;0,05). Yapılan çalımanın yaratıcı drama temelli sosyal beceri eğitimini; çocukların sosyal beceri gelişimlerini, özellikle akran baskısı, kendini ifade edebilme, dinleme ve görevleri tamamlama becerilerinde önemli derecede olumlu yönde etkilediği görülmüştür.</p>


2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Clemens Kruse ◽  
Britney Larson ◽  
Reagan Wilkinson ◽  
Roger Samson ◽  
Taylor Castillo

BACKGROUND Incidence of AD continues to increase, making it the most common cause of dementia and the sixth-leading cause of death in the United States. 2018 numbers are expected to double by 2030. OBJECTIVE We examined the benefits of utilizing technology to identify and detect Alzheimer’s disease in the diagnostic process. METHODS We searched PubMed and CINAHL using key terms and filters to identify 30 articles for review. We analyzed these articles and reported them in accordance with the PRISMA guidelines. RESULTS We identified 11 technologies used in the detection of Alzheimer’s disease: 66% of which used some form of MIR. Functional, structural, and 7T magnetic resonance imaging were all used with structural being the most prevalent. CONCLUSIONS MRI is the best form of current technology being used in the detection of Alzheimer’s disease. MRI is a noninvasive approach that provides highly accurate results in the diagnostic process of Alzheimer’s disease.


Author(s):  
Sara Moslener

For evangelical adolescents living in the United States, the material world of commerce and sexuality is fraught with danger. Contemporary movements urge young people to embrace sexual purity and abstinence before marriage and eschew the secular pressures of modern life. And yet, the sacred text that is used to authorize these teachings betrays evangelicals’ long-standing ability to embrace the material world for spiritual purposes. Bibles marketed to teenage girls, including those produced by and for sexual purity campaigns, make use of prevailing trends in bible marketing. By packaging the message of sexual purity and traditional gender roles into a sleek modern day apparatus, American evangelicals present female sexual restraint as the avant-garde of contemporary, evangelical orthodoxy.


Author(s):  
Jyotsana Parajuli ◽  
Judith E. Hupcey

The number of people with cancer and the need for palliative care among this population is increasing in the United States. Despite this growing need, several barriers exist to the utilization of palliative care in oncology. The purpose of this study was to synthesize the evidence on the barriers to palliative care utilization in an oncology population. A systematic review of literature was conducted following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. PubMed, CINAHL, and Psych Info databases were used for the literature search. Articles were included if they: 1) focused on cancer, (2) examined and discussed barriers to palliative care, and c) were peer reviewed, published in English, and had an accessible full text. A total of 29 studies (8 quantitative, 18 qualitative, and 3 mixed-methods) were identified and synthesized for this review. The sample size of the included studies ranged from 10 participants to 313 participants. The barriers to palliative care were categorized into barriers related to the patient and family, b) barriers related to providers, and c) barriers related to the healthcare system or policy. The factors identified in this review provide guidance for intervention development to mitigate the existing barriers and facilitate the use palliative care in individuals with cancer.


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