Dr Elizabeth Liddle, Associate Professor in Translational Mental Health and Member of CANDAL gave her expert reaction to a recently published study. 

The study is looking at a video game-like digital intervention in children with ADHD, in an article for the Science Media Centre. ‘A novel digital intervention for actively reducing severity of paediatric ADHD (STARS-ADHD): a randomised controlled trial’ by Scott H Kollins et al. was published in the Lancet Digital Health on Monday 24 February 2020, and Dr Liddle's comments were shared with national and international media. 

Dr Elizabeth Liddle commented:

“There is a lot of interest in developing computer games that could help children with ADHD to improve their attention.  Usually the children get better at actually playing the games.  However, there is little evidence so far that any improvements transfer to real-life situations.  This study of the STARS program doesn’t show that either, but then it didn’t try to.  Instead, it set out to first make really sure that STARS has a real impact on the attention-paying skills it is supposed to help, and the results are very promising.  It will be interesting to see whether further studies show real-life and long-term benefits.”

Read the full Science Media Centre article here

Read the Lancet Digital Health article here