Enhancements in Cognitive Performance and Academic Achievement in Adolescents through the Hybridization of an Instructional Model with Gamification in Physical Education

Abstract

An educational physical education (PE) hybridization program based on the personal and social responsibility model and gamification strategies was used in order to explore the effect on cognitive performance and academic achievement. A 9-month group-randomized controlled trial was conducted, with 150 participants (age: 14.63 ± 1.38) allocated into the control group (CG, n = 37) and experimental group (EG, n = 113). Inhibition, verbal fluency, planning, and academic achievement were assessed. Significant differences were observed in the post-test for cognitive inhibition, verbal fluency (named animals), and the mean of both verbal fluency tasks in favor of the EG. With regard to the intervention, verbal fluency (named animals), verbal fluency (named vegetables), the mean of both verbal fluency tasks, cognitive inhibition, language, the average of all subjects, the average of all subjects except PE, and the average from the core subjects increased significantly in the EG. Values for the last five variables (academic variables and cognitive inhibition) in addition to mathematics also increased in the CG. This study contributes to the current knowledge by suggesting that both methodologies produced improvements in the measured variables, but the use of the hybridization resulted in improvements in cognitive performance, specifically with regard to cognitive inhibition and verbal fluency.

Gamification in Physical Education: A Systematic Review

“…The authors highlight, as the main finding, the prevalence of the transfer of autonomy and responsibility in the teacher's behaviors to the participants, which generated a more self-determined motivation among the students, thus improving the levels of autonomy, responsibility and motivation. In a similar study by Melero-Cañas [41] with the hybridization of the social and personal responsibility model and gamification, it was confirmed that the gamified hybrid intervention produced improvements in cardiorespiratory fitness, agility and speed-agility, in addition to reducing the time of sedentary lifestyle during the week and weekend. The students in the control group obtained a greater increase in Body Mass Index.…”

Conceptual Framework of Applied Holistic Education in Physical Education and Sports: A Systematic Review of Empirical Evidence

“…From the 15 selected papers, mostly were experimental research as illustrated in Fig. 2, namely 73% or 11 articles (Cañabate et al, 2020;Kolovelonis et al, 2023;Koszałka-Silska et al, 2021;Luna et al, 2021;Meijer et al, 2022;Melero-Cañas et al, 2021;Mullender-Wijnsma et al, 2019;Pirrie & Lodewyk, 2012;Wawrzyniak et al, 2022), followed by correlational 13% or 2 articles (Gwon & Shin, 2023;Morita et al, 2016), explanatory 7% or 2 articles (Jeon et al, 2021;Rillo-Albert et al, 2021).…”

“…Interventional program is also varied between studies. However, Melero-Cañas et al (2021) and Wawrzyniak et al, (2022) argue that in order to yield significant effect especially on cognitive and psychomotor domain, intervention should be done through whole academic year.…”

“…In order to achieve benefit in fitness and psychomotor while still able to secure the advantage on other learning domain in the framework of holistic education, some researchers suggest that PE lesson should meet the minimum requirement of 20 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) on each session (Morita et al, 2016;Pirrie & Lodewyk, 2012). In addition, ideally it should also be ensured that students feel joy when participating in PE lessons, so that even though the intensity is moderate-tovigorous, students can still show a good learning attitude during learning (Gwon & Shin, 2023;Jeon et al, 2021;Kolovelonis et al, 2023;Melero-Cañas et al, 2021).…”

“…Some factors that can affect a student's cognitive skill include genetics, environment, and education. PE has been found to have a positive impact on cognitive skills (Gwon & Shin, 2023;Kolovelonis et al, 2023;Meijer et al, 2022;Melero-Cañas et al, 2021). PE can improve cognitive skills in several ways.…”