Psychological principles of successful aging technologies: A mini-review

Based on resource-oriented conceptions of successful life-span development, we propose three principles for evaluating assistive technology: (a) net resource release; (b) person specificity, and (c) proximal versus distal frames of evaluation. We discuss how these general principles can aid the design and evaluation of assistive technology in adulthood and old age, and propose two technological strategies, one targeting sensorimotor and the other cognitive functioning. The sensorimotor strategy aims at releasing cognitive resources such as attention and working memory by reducing the cognitive demands of sensory or sensorimotor aspects of performance. The cognitive strategy attempts to provide adaptive and individualized cuing structures orienting the individual in time and space by providing prompts that connect properties of the environment to the individual's action goals. We argue that intelligent assistive technology continuously adjusts the balance between `environmental support' and `self-initiated processing' in person-specific and aging-sensitive ways, leading to enhanced allocation of cognitive resources. Furthermore, intelligent assistive technology may foster the generation of formerly latent cognitive resources by activating developmental reserves (plasticity). We conclude that `lifespan technology', if co-constructed by behavioral scientists, engineers, and aging individuals, offers great promise for improving both the transition from middle adulthood to old age and the degree of autonomy in old age in present and future generations. Copyright (C) 2008 S. Karger AG, Basel

Brain structure across the lifespan : the influence of stress and mood

Normal brain aging is an inevitable and heterogeneous process characterized by a selective pattern of structural changes. Such heterogeneity arises as a consequence of cumulative effects over the lifespan, including stress and mood effects, which drive different micro- and macro-structural alterations in the brain. Investigating these differences in healthy age-related changes is a major challenge for the comprehension of the cognitive status. Herein we addressed the impact of normal aging, stress, mood, and their interplay in the brain gray and white matter (WM) structure. We showed the critical impact of age in the WM volume and how stress and mood influence brain volumetry across the lifespan. Moreover, we found a more profound effect of the interaction of aging/stress/mood on structures located in the left hemisphere. These findings help to clarify some divergent results associated with the aging decline and to enlighten the association between abnormal volumetric alterations and several states that may lead to psychiatric disorders.We are thankful to all study participants. This work was funded by the European Commission (FP7): "SwitchBox" (Contract HEALTH-F2-2010-259772) and co-financed by the Portuguese North Regional Operational Program (ON.2 - O Novo Norte) under the National Strategic Reference Framework (QREN), through the European Regional Development Fund (FEDER). Jose M. Soares, Paulo Marques, and Nadine C. Santos are supported by fellowships of the project "SwitchBox"; Ricardo Magalhaes is supported by a fellowship from the project FCTANR/NEU-OSD/0258/2012 funded by FCT/MEC (www.fct.pt) and by ON.2 - ONOVONORTE - North - Portugal Regional Operational Programme 2007/2013, of the National Strategic Reference Framework (NSRF) 2007/2013, through FEDER

The BDNF Val66Met polymorphism moderates the relationship between cognitive reserve and executive function

The concept of cognitive reserve (CR) has been proposed to account for observed discrepancies between pathology and its clinical manifestation due to underlying differences in brain structure and function. In 433 healthy older adults participating in the Tasmanian Healthy Brain Project, we investigated whether common polymorphic variations in apolipoprotein E (APOE) or brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) influenced the association between CR contributors and cognitive function in older adults. We show that BDNF Val66Met moderates the association between CR and executive function. CR accounted for 8.5% of the variance in executive function in BDNF Val homozygotes, but CR was a nonsignificant predictor in BDNF Met carriers. APOE polymorphisms were not linked to the influence of CR on cognitive function. This result implicates BDNF in having an important role in capacity for building or accessing CR

Beneficial effects of reading aloud and solving simple arithmetic calculations (learning therapy) on a wide range of cognitive functions in the healthy elderly: study protocol for a randomized controlled trial

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Almost all cognitive functions decline with age. Results of previous studies have shown that cognitive training related to everyday life (reading aloud and solving simple arithmetic calculations), namely learning therapy, can improve two cognitive function (executive functions and processing speed) in elderly people. However, it remains unclear whether learning therapy engenders improvement of various cognitive functions or not. We investigate the impact of learning therapy on various cognitive functions (executive functions, episodic memory, short-term memory, working memory, attention, reading ability, and processing speed) in healthy older adults.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>We use a single-blinded intervention with two parallel groups (a learning therapy group and a waiting list control group). Testers are blind to the study hypothesis and the group membership of participants. Through an advertisement in local newspaper, 64 healthy older adults are recruited. They will be assigned randomly to a learning therapy group or a waiting list control group. In the learning therapy group, participants are required to perform two cognitive tasks for 6 months: reading Japanese aloud and solving simple calculations. The waiting list group does not participate in the intervention. The primary outcome measure is the Stroop test score: a measure of executive function. Secondary outcome measures are assessments including the following: verbal fluency task, logical memory, first and second names, digit span forward, digit span backward, Japanese reading test, digit cancellation task, digit symbol coding, and symbol search. We assess these outcome measures before and after the intervention.</p> <p>Discussion</p> <p>This report is the first study which investigates the beneficial effects of learning therapy on a wide range of cognitive functions of elderly people. Our study provides sufficient evidence of learning therapy effectiveness. Most cognitive functions, which are correlated strongly with daily life activities, decrease with age. These study results can elucidate effects of cognitive training on elderly people.</p> <p>Trial registration</p> <p>This trial was registered in The University Hospital Medical Information Network Clinical Trials Registry (No. <a href="http://www.clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/UMIN000006998">UMIN000006998</a>).</p

Patterns and associates of cognitive function, psychosocial wellbeing and health in the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936

BACKGROUND: Cognitive function, psychosocial wellbeing and health are important domains of function. Consistencies and inconsistencies in patterns of wellbeing across these domains may be informative about wellbeing in old age and the ways it is manifested amongst individuals. In this study we investigated whether there were groups of individuals with different profiles of scores across these domains. We also aimed to identify characteristics of any evident groups by comparing them on variables that were not used in identifying the groups. METHODS: The sample was the Lothian Birth Cohort 1936, which included 1091 participants born in 1936. They are a community-dwelling, narrow-age-range sample of 70-year-olds. Most had taken part in the Scottish Mental Survey 1947 at an average age of 11, making available a measure of childhood intelligence. We used latent class analysis (LCA) to explore possible profiles using 9 variables indicating cognitive functioning, psychosocial wellbeing and health status. Demographic, personality, and lifestyle variables – none of which were used in the LCA – were used to characterize the resulting profile groups. RESULTS: We accepted a 3-group solution, which we labeled High Wellbeing (65.3%), Low Cognition (20.3%), and Low Bio-Psychosocial (14.5%). Notably, the High Wellbeing group had significantly higher childhood IQ, lower Neuroticism scores, and a lower percentage of current smokers than the other 2 groups. CONCLUSION: The majority of individuals were functioning generally well; however, there was evidence of the presence of groups with different profiles, which may be explained in part in terms of cognitive ability differences. Results suggested that higher life-long intelligence, personality traits associated with less mental distress, and basic health practices such as avoiding smoking are important associates of wellbeing in old age

The neural representation of intrusive thoughts

Based on the philosophical notion that language embodies thought we investigated whether a habitual tendency for intrusive thought that younger and older participants report over a period of 100 sessions, spread out over about 6 months, is associated with brain regions related to language production. In favour of this hypothesis, we found that individual differences in habitual intrusive thoughts are correlated with activity in the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG, Broca's area) as well as the cingulate cortex (CC) during a two-choice reaction-time task in fMRI. Participants who habitually tended to experience intrusive thoughts showed greater activity during task-free (baseline) compared to task periods in brain regions involved in language production. Task performance was unrelated to individual differences in intrusive thoughts. We conclude that intrusive thoughts may be represented in a language-like format and that individuals reporting a habitually higher tendency for intrusive thoughts may have stronger and more habitual inner speech processes

Generalizing age effects on brain structure and cognition - a two-study comparison approach

Normal aging is accompanied by an interindividually variable decline in cognitive abilities and brain structure. This variability, in combination with methodical differences and differences in sample characteristics across studies, pose a major challenge for generalizability of results from different studies. Therefore, the current study aimed at cross‐validating age‐related differences in cognitive abilities and brain structure (measured using cortical thickness [CT]) in two large independent samples, each consisting of 228 healthy older adults aged between 65 and 85 years: the Longitudinal Healthy Aging Brain (LHAB) database (University of Zurich, Switzerland) and the 1000BRAINS (Research Centre Jülich, Germany). Participants from LHAB showed significantly higher education, physical well‐being, and cognitive abilities (processing speed, concept shifting, reasoning, semantic verbal fluency, and vocabulary). In contrast, CT values were larger for participants of 1000BRAINS. Though, both samples showed highly similar age‐related differences in both, cognitive abilities and CT. These effects were in accordance with functional aging theories, for example, posterior to anterior shift in aging as was shown for the default mode network. Thus, the current two‐study approach provides evidence that independently on heterogeneous metrics of brain structure or cognition across studies, age‐related effects on cognitive ability and brain structure can be generalized over different samples, assuming the same methodology is used