Effects of Irish Dance Classes on Executive Function in Children

In numerous studies in cognitive pshychology were proposed to explain the relationship of physical activity and cognitve domain based both on physiological and developmental mechanisms. The aim of this study was to determine whether there was a relationship between Irish dance learning and the information processing components of attention, memory, reaction, and decision making in school-age children. Based on existing evidence from studies on adults, it was predicted that dancing classes would perform better, that standard physical culture lessons counterparts on a. attention (Bourdon test), b. memory (test A.Luria „Ten words”, A.Ahmejanov „Digit memory test”), c. executive functions i.e., processes required to select, organize, and properly initiate goal-directed actions (Wisconsin card sorting test). 64 children from Arany Janos middle school of Szeged (10-14 years) were selected for the study. The experiment was shown that the effects of Irish dancing classes on attention and memory capacity displayed a trend for dancing children to be slightly better than no-dancing children; however, these differences were significant. Further studies need to continue to explore whether Irish dancing classes have an impact on the components of children’s information processing.