A cross-syndrome comparison of sleep-dependent learning on a cognitive procedural task

Sleep plays a key role in the consolidation of newly acquired information and skills into long term memory. Children with Down syndrome (DS) and Williams syndrome (WS) frequently experience sleep problems, abnormal sleep architecture and difficulties with learning; thus, we predicted that children from these clinical populations would demonstrate impairments in sleep-dependent memory consolidation relative to children with typical development (TD) on a cognitive procedural task: The Tower of Hanoi. Children with DS (n = 17), WS (n = 22) and TD (n = 34) completed the Tower of Hanoi task. They were trained on the task either in the morning or evening, then completed it again following counterbalanced retention intervals of daytime wake and night time sleep. Children with TD and with WS benefitted from sleep for enhanced memory consolidation and improved their performance on the task by reducing the number of moves taken to completion, and by making fewer rule violations. We did not find any large effects of sleep on learning in children with DS, suggesting that these children are not only delayed, but atypical in their learning strategies. Importantly, our findings have implications for educational strategies for all children, specifically considering circadian influences on new learning and the role of children’s night time sleep as an aid to learning.<br/

Reading the Neural Code: What do Spikes Mean for Behavior?

The present study reveals the existence of an intrinsic spatial code within neuronal spikes that predicts behavior. As rats learnt a T-maze procedural task, simultaneous changes in temporal occurrence of spikes and spike directivity are evidenced in &#x201c;expert&#x201d; neurons. While the number of spikes between the tone delivery and the beginning of turn phase reduced with learning, the generated spikes between these two events acquired behavioral meaning that is of highest value for action selection. Spike directivity is thus a hidden feature that reveals the semantics of each spike and in the current experiment, predicts the correct turn that the animal would subsequently make to obtain reward. Semantic representation of behavior can then be revealed as modulations in spike directivity during the time. This predictability of observed behavior based on subtle changes in spike directivity represents an important step towards reading and understanding the underlying neural code

REM sleep is related to the transfer of implicit procedural knowledge following metacognitive learning

Objective: The hypothesis that REM sleep is also related to the transfer of implicit procedural knowledge was tested. Methods: A total of 21female adults (mean age: 19.49years) took part in the study. After a baseline night, participants were randomly assigned to one of two conditions to solve a cognitive procedural task (Tower of Hanoi problem; ToH); on the evening of the assessment night, one group solved the cognitive procedural task with and one group solved the task without metacognitive stimulation. The morning after the assessment night, participants solved three further transfer tasks (ToH with more disks; the Hobbits and Orcs problem; Katona's card problem). Results: Participants with metacognitive stimulation showed an increased performance in all three transfer tasks. Moreover, these participants had a significantly increased REM sleep. Conclusion: REM sleep seems to be related to metacognitively acquired implicit procedural knowledge. The transfer of the acquired implicit procedural knowledge does not seem to be limited to structurally similar task

Differences in Listener Responses between Procedural and Narrative Tasks

In the long tradition of corpus based research on listener behavior, whether it entails linguistic analysis or social signal processing, many different tasks have been used during the recording of the corpus. So far in no study the task which has been given to the participants has been an independent variable and no studies have looked into the effect of this variable on listener responses. In this paper we present the results of our comparison between listening behavior elicited by procedural and narrative tasks which were used during the recording of our MultiLis corpus. We will show that listeners in the procedural tasks show more agreement in their responses than listeners in the narrative tasks. Furthermore we will show that the long procedural task elicits more responses per minute than the short procedural task. We will reflect on these results in light of cognitive load and grounding theory

Realism of procedural task trainers in a pediatric emergency medicine procedures course

Background: Pediatric emergency medicine (PEM) physicians have minimal experience in life saving procedures and have turned to task trainers to learn these skills. Realism of these models is an important consideration that has received little study.Method: PEM physicians and trainees participated in a day long procedural training course that utilized commercially available and homemade task trainers to teach pericardiocentesis, chest tube insertion, cricothyroidotomy and central line insertion. Participants rated the realism of the task trainers as part of a post-course survey.Results: The homemade task trainers received variable realism ratings, with 91% of participants rating the pork rib chest tube model as realistic, 82% rating the gelatin pericardiocentesis mold as realistic and 36% rating the ventilator tubing cricothyroidotomy model as realistic. Commercial trainers also received variable ratings, with 45% rating the chest drain and pericardiocentesis simulator as realistic, 74% rating the crichotracheotomy trainer as realistic and 80% rating the central line insertion trainer as realistic.Conclusions: Task training models utilized in our course received variable realism ratings. When deciding what type of task trainer to use future courses should carefully consider the desired aspect of realism, and how it aligns with the procedural skill, balanced with cost considerations

Effectiveness and User Experience of Augmented and Mixed Reality for Procedural Task Training

Use of augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) technologies for training is increasing, due in part to opportunities for increased immersion, safer training, and reduced costs. However, AR/MR training effectiveness and user experience, particularly for head-mounted displays (HMDs), is not well understood. The purpose of this study is to investigate user perceptions and retention of AR/MR training delivered through a HMD for a procedural task. This two-part study utilized a within-subjects experimental design with 30 participants to determine how instruction method (paper vs. AR vs. MR) and time of procedure recall (immediate vs. post-test vs. retention) influenced completion time, perceived task difficulty, perceived confidence in successfully completing the task, workload, user experience, and trainee reactions. Results indicate differences between instruction methods for user experience and preference, with significantly higher user experience ratings for MR and lower preference rankings for AR. Findings also show decreased performance, increased perceived task difficulty, and decreased confidence as time since training increased, with no significant differences in these measures between instruction methods. Completion times and workload were also found to be comparable between instruction methods. This work provides insight into objective and subjective differences between paper-, AR-, and MR-based training experiences, which can be used to determine which type of training is best suited for a particular use case. Recommendations for appropriately matching training modalities and scenarios, as well as for how to successfully design AR/MR training experiences, are discussed

Text, graphics, and multimedia materials employed in learning a computer-based procedural task

The present research study investigated the interaction of graphic design students with different forms of software training materials. Four versions of the procedural task instructions were developed (A) Traditional Textbook with Still Images, (B) Modified Text with Integrated Still Images, (C) Onscreen Modified Text with Silent Onscreen Video and (D) Onscreen Narrated Video for four computer tasks. Two research questions guided the study: Research Question 1: Are there any significant differences in student learning of a computer-based procedural task due to the format of the training materials? Research Question 2: Do individual differences in prior knowledge and spatial abilities make a significant difference in student learning? This study included quantitative research methods. The population for the study consisted of sophomore and junior graphics students enrolled in the Computer Applications in Graphics (GRAPHICS 1150) course in the Department of Graphics Technology at a Fairmont State University and Pierpont Community and Technical College during the 2009 spring semester. One section had 8 participants and the other 11 (N=19). The six instruments used to collect data for this study were a Prior Knowledge pre-test, the MRT (a Mental Rotations Test), and 4 counterbalanced graphics image-manipulation tasks. The findings indicate that high spatial ability and high prior knowledge positively affected student\u27s scores on the graphics image-manipulation tasks and that Training Condition B (Modified Text with Integrated Still Images) was a positive contributor to test scores on the counterbalanced image manipulation tasks. The participants experienced shorter task completion times for any task trained with the Modified Text with Integrated Still Images materials

The Impact of a Mnemonic Acronym on Learning and Performing a Procedural Task and Its Resilience Toward Interruptions

The present study examines the potential impact of a mnemonic acronym on the learning, the execution, the resilience toward interruptions, and the mental representation of an eight-step procedural task with sequential constraints. 65 participants were required to learn a sequential task, including eight different steps which had to be carried out in a predefined sequence. 33 participants were provided with the acronym “WORTKLAU” as a mnemonic to support the learning and execution of the task and the other 32 participants had to learn and execute the task without such support. Each letter of the acronym coded one step of the task, involving a binary decision about a certain property of the complex stimulus. In 60 out of 72 trials of the task, participants were interrupted between different steps, and had to perform a 2-back interruption task for 6 or 30 s, after which they had to resume the procedural task as quickly as possible at the correct step. Learning times, performance in uninterrupted trials, and post-interruption performance measures were analyzed. Results of Experiment 1 suggest that the mnemonic acronym enhanced learning of the task sequence, and provide some evidence for a hierarchical mental representation of the task, resulting in faster resumption times at certain steps of the procedure after an interruption. In Experiment 2 the internal structure of the acronym was even emphasized by a hyphen at the borders of the two words included in the acronym (WORT-KLAU). This improved the resilience toward interruptions at the border step of the procedure significantly. Our results provide evidence for beneficial effects of mnemonic acronym particularly for the learning of a sequential procedural task. In addition, they suggest that the structure of mnemonic acronym directly impacts the mental representation of a task. Finally, they show that mnemonic acronyms could be used to improve the resilience toward detrimental effect of interruptions, at least at certain task steps of a procedural task.TU Berlin, Open-Access-Mittel – 201

Degradation of learned skills. A review and annotated bibliography

An overview of the literature dealing with the retention of learned skills is presented. Basic effects of task type, training, retention interval, and recall variables are discussed, providing a background against which more recent literature dealing with operational spaceflights tasks is compared and assessed. Detailed and summary abstracts of research reports having particular relevance to the problem of spaceflight skill retention are provided