Karen Torres Martínez
This systematic review examined the empirical evidence on gamification applied to the behavioral management of neurodivergent elementary school students, particularly those with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Following the PRISMA 2020 protocol, 17 open-access empirical studies published between 2021 and 2025 were analyzed, appraised using JBI quality criteria, and thematically synthesized around five research questions. Findings identified seven types of gamified strategies—adaptive AI-driven applications, virtual reality, exergames, cognitive-physical interventions, personalized digital therapeutics, and cooperative board games—producing favorable, statistically significant effects on sustained attention, inhibitory control, ADHD symptoms, executive functions, social skills, and academic performance. These behavioral effects converge with neurophysiological evidence and are grounded in seven theoretical frameworks spanning operant conditioning, reward neuroscience, and motivational and learning theories. However, the corpus shows marked geographic concentration in East Asia, an almost complete absence of Latin American evidence, scarce longitudinal follow-up, a predominance of clinical over school-based contexts, and a systematic failure to document the behavioral function underlying the target behavior. The review concludes that gamification rests on solid empirical grounds, but its translation to real inclusive classrooms staffed by generalist teachers requires additional research that is culturally situated and methodologically more precise. Keywords: gamification, behavioral management, neurodivergence, ADHD, ASD, elementary education.