TY  - JOUR
PY  - 2014//
TI  - How Effective Are Active Videogames Among the Young and the Old? Adding Meta-analyses to Two Recent Systematic Reviews
JO  - Games for health journal
A1  - Van 't Riet, Jonathan
A1  - Crutzen, Rik
A1  - Lu, Amy Shirong
SP  - 311
EP  - 318
VL  - 3
IS  - 5
N2  - OBJECTIVE: Two recent systematic reviews have surveyed the existing evidence for the effectiveness of active videogames in children/adolescents and in elderly people. In the present study, effect sizes were added to these systematic reviews, and meta-analyses were performed. <br><br>MATERIALS AND METHODS: All reviewed studies were considered for inclusion in the meta-analyses, but only studies were included that investigated the effectiveness of active videogames, used an experimental design, and used actual health outcomes as the outcome measures (body mass index for children/adolescents [k=5] and functional balance for the elderly [k=6]). <br><br>RESULTS: The average effect of active videogames in children and adolescents was small and nonsignificant: Hedges' g=0.20 (95 percent confidence interval, -0.08 to 0.48). Limited heterogeneity was observed, and no moderator analyses were performed. For the effect of active videogames on functional balance in the elderly, the analyses revealed a medium-sized and significant effect of g=0.68 (95 percent confidence interval, 0.13-1.24). For the elderly studies, substantial heterogeneity was observed. Moderator analyses showed that there were no significant effects of using a no-treatment control group versus an alternative treatment control group or of using games that were especially created for health-promotion purposes versus off-the-shelf games. Also, intervention duration and frequency, sample size, study quality, and dropout did not significantly moderate the effect of active videogames. <br><br>CONCLUSIONS: The results of these meta-analyses provide preliminary evidence that active videogames can have positive effects on relevant outcome measures in children/adolescents and elderly individuals.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>
LA  - en
SN  - 2161-783X
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.1089/g4h.2014.0005
ID  - ref1
ER  -