ArticleFrontiers in psychology2016
An fMRI Study of the Impact of Block Building and Board Games on Spatial Ability.
Article in Frontiers in psychology, 2016. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 15 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
15 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Training-Induced Neural Plasticity in Youth: A Systematic Review of Structural and Functional MRI Studies.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2020Pooled it
- Visuospatial perspective-taking in social-emotional development: enhancing young children's mind and emotion understanding via block building training.BMC psychology · 2022Trial
- Review
- Development of a spatial skills test for 4th grade primary school students: validity and reliability study.Frontiers in psychology · 2026Article
- Investigating the Impact of the AI-Supported 5E (AI-s5E) Instructional Model on Spatial Ability.Behavioral sciences (Basel, Switzerland) · 2024Article
- Benefits of Playing at School: Filler Board Games Improve Visuospatial Memory and Mathematical Skills.Brain sciences · 2024Article
- NeuroSmog: Determining the Impact of Air Pollution on the Developing Brain: Project Protocol.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2021Article
- Block-building performance test using a virtual reality head-mounted display in children with intermittent exotropia.Eye (London, England) · 2021Article
- The Development of Spatial Representation Through Teaching Block-Building in Kindergartners.Frontiers in psychology · 2020Article
- Spatial Skills Associated With Block-Building Complexity in Preschoolers.Frontiers in psychology · 2020Article
- The Impact of Individual Differences, Types of Model and Social Settings on Block Building Performance among Chinese Preschoolers.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Article
- Shared and Distinct Neural Bases of Large- and Small-Scale Spatial Ability: A Coordinate-Based Activation Likelihood Estimation Meta-Analysis.Frontiers in neuroscience · 2018Article
- Toward a Neuroscientific Understanding of Play: A Dimensional Coding Framework for Analyzing Infant-Adult Play Patterns.Frontiers in psychology · 2018Article
- Higher extrinsic and lower intrinsic connectivity in resting state networks for professional Baduk (Go) players.Brain and behavior · 2017Article
- Diversity of spatial activities and parents' spatial talk complexity predict preschoolers' gains in spatial skills.Child developmentArticle
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Previous studies have found that block play, board games, and puzzles result in better spatial ability. This study focused on examining the differential impact of structured block play and board games on spatial processing. Two groups of 8-year-old children were studied. One group participated in a five session block play training paradigm and the second group had a similar training protocol but played a word/spelling board game. A mental rotation task was assessed before and after training. The mental rotation task was performed during fMRI to observe the neural changes associated with the two play protocols. Only the block play group showed effects of training for both behavioral measures and fMRI measured brain activation. Behaviorally, the block play group showed improvements in both reaction time and accuracy. Additionally, the block play group showed increased involvement of regions that have been linked to spatial working memory and spatial processing after training. The board game group showed non-significant improvements in mental rotation performance, likely related to practice effects, and no training related brain activation differences. While the current study is preliminary, it does suggest that different "spatial" play activities have differential impacts on spatial processing with structured block play but not board games showing a significant impact on mental rotation performance.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.