INTENSITEA Protocolo de exercício físico para funções executivas de universitários(as) com TEA

Abstract

When we talking about students with ASD in higher education, the challenges tend to increase to (a) the heterogeneous characteristic of this group, in which each one reveals itself within a spectrum, with distinct characteristics and (b) little access to scientific information by teachers. This qualitative, applied and exploratory research aims to develop and validate a physical exercise protocol that stimulates executive functions of attention, inhibition and working memory in students with ASD, to be used by professionals who serve this public in higher education. The study consisted of four male participants, aged between 19 and 23 years, undergraduate students at the Federal University of Pará, Belém campus, who had a diagnosis of ASD or ASD with other associated comorbidities. Each student was invited to participate in three sessions of on line interventions through the Google Meet platform, the 1st session being aimed at explaining the research procedures to him and his guardian, the 2nd one consisted of the control session, in which the cognitive tests and viewing a 25-minute informative video. The 3rd session took place seven days after the 2nd session and the cognitive tests and 25 minutes of moderate-intensity physical exercises were performed. Each session lasted an average of 60 minutes. The activities validated by students with ASD contributed to the creation of the final research product, a physical exercise protocol that is presented in two formats: PDF document and MP4 video class. These two formats were also validated by a panel of experts composed of seven professionals, including pedagogues, occupational therapists, physical education and design, advertising, social media and marketing teachers. The Intensitea product is a didactic instructional basis for professionals who can use the protocol with students with ASD in higher education to improve performance in tasks that demand good functioning of attention, inhibition and working memory.