Verbal learning

BACKGROUND: Lutein and zeaxanthin are carotenoids associated with better cognition at older age. To our knowledge, no previous study has evaluated their cognitive implications in the prenatal period, when the brain undergoes its most rapid development. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to examine associations of maternal lutein and zeaxanthin (L/Z) intake during pregnancy with child cognition. DESIGN: Among 1580 mother-child pairs in Project Viva, a prospective cohort, we assessed maternal intake of L/Z during pregnancy using food frequency questionnaires and offspring cognition by the Visual Recognition Memory paradigm in infancy, the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and the Wide Range Assessment of Visual Motor Abilities (WRAVMA) in early childhood, and the Kaufman Brief Intelligence Test (KBIT-II), the WRAVMA drawing subtest, and the Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning in mid-childhood...

OBJECTIVE: Clinicians may use implicit or explicit motor learning approaches to facilitate motor learning of patients with stroke. Implicit motor learning approaches have shown promising results in healthy populations. The purpose of this study was to assess whether an implicit motor learning walking intervention is more effective compared to an explicit motor learning walking intervention delivered at home with regard to walking speed in people after stroke in the chronic phase of recovery...

BACKGROUND: Dietary lipids (omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3) PUFAs) and saturated fatty acids (SFA) seem to play an important role for brain health. (n-3) PUFAs have been shown to improve cerebral perfusion and to promote synaptogenesis. In this study, we investigated the relationship between dietary fat composition, cognitive performance and brain morphology in cognitively healthy individuals. METHODS: 101 cognitively healthy participants (age: 42.3 ± 21...

Researchers have noted sex differences in verbal memory performance with females showing a memory superiority effect. Research paradigms have largely incorporated experimenter-timed materials. Therefore, the extent to which self-regulating study time influences this pattern of sex differences is unclear. The researcher reexamined data from a published paper to determine whether sex differences in multitrial verbal learning are minimized when individuals self-regulate their study time, or if sex differences would still remain...

Background To determine if accelerometer measured sedentary behavior (SED), light-intensity physical activity (LPA), and moderate-to-vigorous-intensity physical activity (MVPA) in midlife is prospectively associated with cognitive function. Methods and Results Participants were 1970 adults enrolled in the CARDIA (Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults) study who wore an accelerometer in 2005 to 2006 (ages 38-50 years) and had cognitive function assessments completed 5 and/or 10 years later. SED, LPA, and MVPA were measured by an ActiGraph 7164 accelerometer...

CONTEXT: Although differences in clinical interactions with patients between students and experienced clinicians are well described, differences in therapeutic training behaviors have not been explored, especially in relation to motor learning principles. AIMS: This pilot study compared clinical behaviors between speech language pathology (SLP) students and experienced SLPs in a voice therapy task, using prepractice variables in the Motor Learning Classification Framework (MLCF)...

Functional changes in the brain during aging can alter learning and memory, gait, and balance - in some cases leading to early cognitive decline, disability, or injurious falls among older adults. Dietary interventions with strawberry (SB) have been associated with improvements in neuronal, psychomotor, and cognitive function in rodent models of aging. We hypothesized that dietary supplementation with SB would improve mobility and cognition among older adults. In this study, 22 men and 15 women, between the ages of 60 and 75 years, were recruited into a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial in which they consumed either freeze-dried SB (24g/d, equivalent to 2 cups of fresh SB) or a SB placebo for 90 days...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Cognitive impairment after stroke, especially executive and attention dysfunction, is common, negatively affects daily functioning, and has limited treatment options. A single-blind, parallel-design, randomized controlled trial was used to examine the impact of goal setting on poststroke cognitive performance. METHODS: Stroke survivors (n=72; mean age, 68.38 [SD=11.84] years; 69.4% men) in the chronic phase (≥3 months) after stroke from an academic stroke prevention clinic were randomly assigned to receive goal-setting instructions (n=36) or standard instructions (n=36) after completing baseline cognitive measures of executive function (primary outcome), attention/working memory, verbal learning, and verbal recall...

BACKGROUND: Cognitive impairment (CI) affects 35-65% of multiple sclerosis (MS) patients. The Brief International Cognitive Assessment for Multiple Sclerosis (BICAMS) has been proposed as a highly feasible and cost-effective tool for cognitive impairment (CI) screening in MS. The tool yields scores that should, ideally, readily convey patients' cognitive status to the clinicians. METHODS: To this aim, this study sought for cut-off scores of the three BICAMS test in a sample of 960 MS patients...

Visual categorization is fundamental to expertise in a wide variety of disparate domains, such as radiology, art history, and quality control. The pervasive need to master visual categories has served as the impetus for a vast body of research dedicated to exploring how to enhance the learning process. The literature is clear on one point: no category learning technique is always superior to another. In the present review, we discuss how two factors moderate the efficacy of learning techniques. The first, category similarity, refers to the degree of featural overlap of exemplars...

HIV-exposed uninfected (HEU) children may be at-risk for poorer academic achievement compared to HIV-unexposed uninfected (HUU) children due to in utero and perinatal exposure to HIV and/or anti-retroviral (ARV) medication. Understanding the risk factors for academic underachievement is important for implementing timely intervention and academic supports. HEU (N = 110, mean (SD) age 5.59 (0.22) years) and HUU (N = 43, mean (SD) age 5.73 (0.64) years) children completed assessments of general intelligence (WPPSI-III) and academic achievement (WRAT-4)...

Hypertension is related to increased risk of cognitive decline in a highly age-dependent manner. However, conflicting evidence exists on the relation between age of hypertension onset and cognition. Our goal was to investigate the association between early- versus late-onset hypertension and midlife cognitive performance in 2946 CARDIA study (Coronary Artery Risk Development in Young Adults) participants (mean age 55±4, 57% women). The participants underwent 9 repeat examinations, including blood pressure measurements, between 1985 to 1986 and 2015 to 2016...

Objective : Prior research suggests maximal physical exertion (MPE) may negatively affect the reliability and validity of computerized neurocognitive testing (CNT); the purpose of this study was to identify aclinically relevant recovery interval following MPE for the administration of baseline CNT. Design : Random-crossover. Participants : Thirty (M = 21.87 ± 2.29 y), moderately-active,healthy participants, without history of ADHD, learning disabilities, psychological disorders or concussion (within the last six months)...

Effective lecturing stimulates learning, creates a verbal history for our profession, and is a central basis for evaluating academic promotion. Unfortunately, few resources exist in the medical literature to guide the academician toward success as an effective lecturer. Using evidence-based principles, this review fosters adult learning in academic venues by incorporating the latest innovations in educational theory for both online and traditional teaching. The novice or advanced academic teacher will be guided toward critical self-evaluation of current teaching practices and encouraged to replace ineffective methods with ones more likely to be both rewarding and rewarded...

When producing connected speech, bilinguals often select a default-language as the primary force driving the utterance. The present study investigated the cognitive mechanisms underlying default language selection. In three experiments, Spanish-English bilinguals named pictures out of context, or read aloud sentences with a single word replaced by a picture with a cognate (e.g., lemon-limón) or noncognate name (e.g., table-mesa). Cognates speeded naming and significantly reduced switching costs. Critically, cognate effects were not modulated by sentence context...

BACKGROUND: Cognitive impairment is prevalent among frail older adults. Traditional exercise and exergaming positively affect cognition in healthy older people. However, few studies have investigated the effects of exergaming on cognition and brain activation in frail older adults. OBJECTIVE: This study compared the effect of Kinect based exergaming (EXER) and combined physical exercise (CPE) training on cognitive function and brain activation in frail older adults in Taiwan...

OUR SITUATION: Cognitive interviews (CIs) and think-aloud protocols (TAPs) are two strategies that offer unique approaches to capture participant thought processes when engaging with instruments and interventions. In this paper, we describe the origins of CIs and TAPs, the types of research questions they can be used to address, and strategies to implement these approaches. METHODOLOGICAL LITERATURE REVIEW: CIs and TAPs are interview methods that make thought processes more explicit...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Team-based learning (TBL) has been successfully applied to multiple healthcare education disciplines. A primary tenet of TBL is the development of solutions leveraging the collective knowledge of a team rather than the individual competency of any one student. In an effort to enhance individual student accountability, an individual verbal defense (IVD) format was implemented in a multi-campus TBL-based pharmacotherapeutics course. The study sought to investigate the use of TBL-IVD embedded within a traditional TBL format on student engagement, teaching style preferences, and exam performance compared to a TBL-only format...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: This study explored the effect of a structured educational intervention for student pharmacists to counsel limited English proficiency (LEP) patients on risks and safety of opioid medications for chronic pain. Specific aims were to compare 2018 pre-intervention versus 2019 post-intervention groups regarding: (1) dose and side effects discussed, (2) opioid risks and safety measures covered, and (3) LEP specific communication practices. EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITY AND SETTING: Third-year student pharmacists (P3s) in a required communications course consulted LEP standardized patients (SPs) on opioid medications in 2018 and 2019...

INTRODUCTION: The objective of this project was to evaluate the effect of adjusting the solution reporting phase of problem-based learning (PBL) while keeping core components of the pedagogy constant. METHODS: A PBL course for third year pharmacy students changed delivery of the problem solution from a written format to a verbal defense. Comparisons were made between the written format and verbal defense groups. The primary outcome was the change in the motivation domain of the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ)...