Comparative effectiveness of virtual reality vs. traditional motor games on developmental functioning and motor skills in autistic children spectrum disorder: a cohort study.

INTRODUCTION: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a prevalent neurodevelopmental condition with progressively increasing prevalence, and traditional sports game interventions often face challenges in achieving sustained improvements in both developmental functioning and motor proficiency. METHODS: This prospective cohort study compared the effects of traditional sports game interventions vs. immersive virtual reality (VR) exergaming on developmental functioning and motor skills in autistic children, and evaluated the long-term stability of outcomes. Assessments using the Gesell Developmental Schedules (GDS) and the PREFIT motor test battery were conducted at three time points: pre-intervention, immediately after the 8-week intervention, and 8 weeks after intervention cessation; both protocols were designed by a hospital-based multidisciplinary team. RESULTS: Immersive VR exergaming demonstrated a trend toward greater improvements in most GDS subdomains and most PREFIT components compared with traditional sports game interventions, with the experimental group showing larger magnitudes of improvement during the intervention period. Scores on some PREFIT subdomains continued to increase during the 8-week follow-up period. DISCUSSION: Due to the non-randomized design and the absence of a no-treatment control group, these findings should be interpreted as preliminary evidence. The potential advantages of immersive VR exergaming warrant further investigation through more rigorously designed randomized controlled trials.