Speaker ed. 2021 | Area Digital Learning
Andrea Facoetti is Associate Professor in Psychobiology and Physiological Psychology, teaches Developmental and Rehabilitation Psychobiology and Neuropsychology at the University of Padua. He directs the Laboratory of Cognitive Developmental Neuroscience at the Department of General Psychology of the University of Padua where the psychobiological bases of several neurodevelopment disorders – such as dyslexia and developmental dyscalculia, language and autism spectrum disorders – are investigated. The evidence from our studies seems to demonstrate that the development of domain specific cognitive functions such as reading, numerical or social cognition are strongly conditioned by the efficiency of general domain functions such as perception and attention. Indeed, our longitudinal studies show that – in the early stages of development – the perceptual and attentional mechanisms – mainly controlled by the dorsal or action pathway – are able to predict the future development of functions such as reading and numerical cognition. In addition, rehabilitation treatments that improve perceptual and attentional mechanisms – such as action video games – are able to improve the efficiency of reading and numerical cognition in children with specific learning disorder.