ONLINE ENVIRONMENT TO SUPPORT THE INTERVENTION OF EXECUTIVE FUNCTIONS IN YOUNG CHILDREN: USER NEEDS IN A PILOT STUDY

Executive Functions (EFs) refer to a family of adaptive, goal-directed, top-down mental processes needed to focus and pay attention, and when an automatic response would not be adequate. EFs develop over a long period of time, but the most remarkable changes in EFs development occur during the first years of life. In this period, EFs seem to be associated to other cognitive domains such as self-regulation, social cognition and representational systems. Deficits in EFs can commonly be found in children with atypical development, such as those with language difficulties, Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), and symptoms of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). For this reason, researchers have recently begun to show increasing interest in studying EFs in young children, focusing in particular on EFs interventions in both educational and clinical contexts. But while there is a great deal of research work on this topic available in the scientific literature, health care professionals, teachers and parents often experience difficulty finding appropriate, low-cost resources - whether analogue or digital - to foster EFs development in young children. This issue is addressed in the study described in this paper, which is part of a broader research project named ShareFUN being conducted by the Italian National Research Council’s Institute for Educational Technology (CNR-ITD). ShareFUN is aimed at investigating the needs of three different user groups (health care professionals, teachers and parents) in carrying out interventions to foster EFs in the first years of life using appropriate low-cost analogue and digital resources in both clinical and educational contexts. In this regard, the study reported here addresses two specific research questions: (RQ1) Do users feel an online platform providing resources to foster EFs in early life would be useful in their particular contexts of activity?; (RQ2) What resources do they think it would be useful to find on such an online platform? To respond to these research questions, this study engaged a sample of eighty-four users from the three above mentioned user groups. Data were collected through a custom-designed questionnaire comprising a set of multiple-choice items. Overall, the findings revealed that most users find access to an online platform dedicated to resources for enhancing EFs in the first years of life would be useful. Furthermore, respondents placed special emphasis on the importance of being able to (a) download printable paper exercises for enhancing EFs, and (b) consult information sheets on resources for fostering EFs in young children. In conclusion, on the basis of this needs analysis, a team of CNR-ITD researchers is implementing an online environment for sharing information and experience about low-cost resources and materials for fostering early childhood EFs in both educational and clinical contexts. This platform will provide users with a set of potentially useful features and capabilities. These include the opportunity to download an app designed to measure EFs in young children, a particularly useful tool for planning and developing an educational and/or clinical-based intervention that accounts for individual differences. The platform will also make available detailed guidelines and materials (in versions dedicated to both clinical and educational settings) for conducting playful digital and non-digital training activities particularly suitable for enhancing young children’s EFs. In addition, information sheets on (digital and non-digital) resources for fostering EFs will be made available through the platform, which will also offer users training courses on this topic and provide them with the opportunity to share experiences with fellow members of the ShareFUN community.