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Clinical Trial
. 2014 Feb 28;9(2):e90747.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0090747. eCollection 2014.

Good vibrations--effects of whole body vibration on attention in healthy individuals and individuals with ADHD

Anselm B M Fuermaier  1 , Lara Tucha  1 , Janneke Koerts  1 , Marieke J G van Heuvelen  2 , Eddy A van der Zee  3 , Klaus W Lange  4 , Oliver Tucha  1
Affiliations
Clinical Trial

Good vibrations--effects of whole body vibration on attention in healthy individuals and individuals with ADHD

Anselm B M Fuermaier et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Objectives: Most of the current treatment strategies of ADHD are associated with a number of disadvantages which strengthen the need for alternative or additional approaches for the treatment of ADHD. In this respect, Whole Body Vibration (WBV) might be interesting as it was found to have beneficial effects on a variety of physiological measures. The present study explored the effects of WBV on attention of healthy individuals and adults diagnosed with ADHD.

Methods: Eighty-three healthy individuals and seventeen adults diagnosed with ADHD participated in the study. WBV treatment was applied passively, while participants were sitting on a chair which was mounted on a vibrating platform. A repeated measure design was employed in order to explore potential effects of WBV treatment on attention within subjects. Attention (i.e. inhibitory control) was measured with a color-word interference paradigm.

Results: A period of two minutes of WBV treatment had significant beneficial effects of small to medium size on attention of both healthy individuals and adults with ADHD. The effect of WBV treatment on attention did not differ significantly between groups.

Conclusions: WBV was demonstrated to improve cognitive performance of healthy individuals as well as of individuals with ADHD. WBV treatment is relatively inexpensive and easy to apply and might therefore be of potential relevance for clinical use. The application of WBV treatment as a cognitive enhancement strategy and as a potential treatment of cognitive impairments is discussed.

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Conflict of interest statement

Competing Interests: The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1. Drawing of the vibrating platform with the mounted wooden platform and chair.
Accelerations were measured at location A, B, C and D to determine the actual vibration frequency and amplitude.
Figure 2
Figure 2. Schematic drawing of the experimental procedure consisting of eight experimental trials.
V = Vibration condition: WBV treatment for two minutes; R = Resting condition: No WBV treatment for two minutes; B = Break: Breaks of three minutes (resting); Stroop test = Stroop Color-Word Interference task (Color-Word Interference Test, Color Block Test); For analysis, mean scores were calculated across the four experimental trials for each treatment condition (vibration and resting).
Figure 3
Figure 3. Mean interference quotient for performance of the Stroop Color-Word Interference task following resting and vibration, for both healthy individuals and individuals with ADHD (M±SE).
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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