Cognitive Engagement and Aging Mind

Cognitive Engagement and Aging Mind: A Randomized Control Trial to Determine the Effects of Adaptive Real-time Strategy Game Training on Cognition and Brain Functions of Older Adults

The purpose of this research is to examine whether and to what extent training of different types of cognitive engagement will improve performance on fluid cognitive abilities that typically decline with age. The research covered by this protocol will use behavioral data that yield response latencies and accuracies of the untrained tasks, and brain activations in fMRI tasks, to test specific hypotheses about neural plasticity and cognitive plasticity from these engagement techniques. Hence, human subjects will be employed in an experiment lasting for 20 hours spanning over 2 months where they will either receive real-time strategy-based videogame training or crystallized intelligence training. In addition, long-term retention data will be obtained after 6 month post-training to investigate any long-term benefits.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Age-related Cognitive Decline
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Real-time strategy-based videogame training; Behavioral: Semantic Knowledge training

Detailed Description

The purpose of this research is to examine whether and to what extent training of different types of cognitive engagement will improve performance on fluid cognitive abilities that typically decline with age (such as, speed of information processing, working memory capacity, episodic memory, and executive functions). The research covered by this protocol will use behavioral data that yield response latencies and accuracies of the untrained tasks, and brain activations in fMRI tasks, to test specific hypotheses about the extent of transfer, if any, and the underlying cognitive constructs that may be trained in the process. Hence, human subjects will be employed in an experiment lasting for 20 hours spanning over 2 months where they will either receive real-time strategy-based videogame training or crystallized intelligence training. In addition, long-term retention data will be obtained after 6 month post-training to investigate any long-term benefits.

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 58
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Texas
    • Dallas, Texas, United States, 75235
      • The Center for Vital Longevity (UT Dallas)

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Right-handed
• over 50 Years of Age
• native or fluent English speaker
• not Color-blind
• Magnetic Resonance Imaging eligible
• Mini Mental Status Examination Score >24

Exclusion Criteria:

• Left-handed or ambidextrous
• younger than 50
• cannot distinguish colors during color blindness test
• claustrophobia
• metal artifact in body
• over 300 lb
• pacemaker
• MMSE score lower than 24
• history of stroke
• history of substance or alcohol abuse
• currently taking anti-psychotic or anti-depression medication

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Treatment
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: Single

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Real-time strategy-based videogame training; Participants played a real-time strategy-based videogame in laboratory setting, Rise of Nations, for 2 hours a day, two days per week, for 5 weeks.	Behavioral: Real-time strategy-based videogame training; Rise of Nation is a complex strategy-based video game, in which individualized-adaptive feedbacks are constantly given to players based on their performance.
Active Comparator: Crystallized intelligence training; Participants completed a series of crossword puzzles each week, for 5-6 weeks. Training sessions were completed at the participants' home or area of preference. Participant received a periodic phone call (2 times per week) from research staff to update any notes or details regarding participants' study progress.	Behavioral: Semantic Knowledge training; Packages of various cross-word puzzles include word search, word ladder, and word wheel.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Immediate change in the composite score of executive functions	Change in the composite score of executive functions, and its subcomponents, from baseline to post-training. Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks
Immediate change in the composite score of episodic memory	Change in the composite score of episodic memory from baseline to post-training.Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks
Immediate change in brain activations during executive functions: multi-tasking	Change in fMRI brain activations from baseline to post-training.	9-11 weeks
Immediate change in brain activations during executive functions: working memory updating	Change in fMRI brain activations from baseline to post-training.	9-11 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Immediate change in the composite score of working memory capacity	Change in the composite score of working memory capacity from baseline to post-training.Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks
Immediate change in the fluid reasoning measure	Change in the fluid reasoning measure (Raven's Advanced Progressive Matrices, a paper and pencil test) from baseline to post-training. Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks
immediate change in the composite score of cognition	Change in composite score of cognition from baseline to long-term retention. Composite score for overall cognition is summed across composite scores for executive function, processing speed, processing speed, working memory capacity and fluid reasoning. Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks

Other Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Immediate change in the processing speed construct	Change in the processing speed construct from baseline to post-training. Higher change in score represents better outcome.	9-11 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: The University of Texas at Dallas
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Chandramallika Basak, Ph.D., The University of Texas at Dallas

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): January 31, 2013
• Primary Completion (Actual): April 1, 2018
• Study Completion (Actual): October 1, 2018

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: May 7, 2021
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 20, 2023
• First Posted (Actual): June 29, 2023

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): June 29, 2023
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 20, 2023
• Last Verified: May 1, 2021

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Additional Relevant MeSH Terms: Mental Disorders; Neurocognitive Disorders; Cognition Disorders; Cognitive Dysfunction
• Other Study ID Numbers: IRB 12-57

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO
• IPD Plan Description: This is not a federally funded data, so no IDP is planned to be shared. However, all descriptive statistics will be provided in the publications, therefore, all meaningful data for the outcomes will be reported for any future meta-analyses or calculations of effect size.

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No