Delayed Recall Task Research Articles

Vocabulary teaching method using conditional discrimination and delayed recall tasks for special education class children

Vocabulary teaching method using conditional discrimination and delayed recall tasks for special education class children

Effectiveness of immediate vs. delayed recall in detecting invalid performance in coached and uncoached simulators: Results of two experimental studies

Objective: Two experimental studies were conducted to compare the ability of immediate and delayed recall indicators to discriminate between performances of simulators and full-effort clinical and nonclinical participants. Methods: Three groups of simulators (uncoached, symptom-coached, and testcoached), one group of community controls, and one group of cognitively impaired patients were assessed with four experimental memory tests, in which the immediate and delayed recall tasks were separated by three other tasks. Results: Across both studies, delayed recall demonstrated higher accuracy than immediate recall in classifying simulated performances as invalid, as compared to performances of bona fide clinical participants. ROC curve results showed sensitivities below 50% for both indicators at specificities of ≥ 90%. Computing performance curves across recall trials revealed descending trends for all three simulator groups indicating a suppressed learning effect as a marker of noncredible performances. Among types of coaching, test-coaching proved to decrease differences between simulators and patients. Discussion: The effectiveness of such indicators in clinical evaluations and their vulnerability to information about test-taking strategies are discussed.

Investigating Sequential and Simultaneous Changes in Trajectories of Cognitive Decline and Depressive Symptoms

Background. The role of depression as risk factor or early symptom of cognitive decline and dementia is still debated. Exploiting longitudinal trajectories of memory recall in a large European sample, we sought to better understand the nature of simultaneous versus sequential changes in depressive symptoms alongside memory recall at older ages. Method. A total of 4,865 respondents to the SHARE survey, mean age at t1 61.5 years (SD = 7.53), completed the EURO-D depression scale and a delayed recall task across six waves spanning ~13 years. We applied k-means clustering to distinguish trajectories of depressive symptoms and delayed recall. Clusters indicating depressive and recall trajectories were included in logistic regressions to assess likelihood of parallel versus sequential change, controlling for age, gender, employment status and education. Results. Analyses revealed six distinct trajectories each for depressive symptoms and delayed recall. Visual inspections indicated that only declining recall trajectories showed increases in depressive symptoms, occurring simultaneously rather than sequentially. Using grouped declining recall trajectories as outcome, the low-increasing depressive symptoms trajectory was associated with cognitive decline (OR = 1.52 [1.11, 2.06]), whereas the stable-high depressive symptoms trajectory was associated with cognitive decline in respondents aged 60-69 years (OR = 1.78 [1.01, 3.16]). Discussion. Distinguishing trajectories in depression and recall incorporates longitudinal information able to further elucidate relationships between depression and cognition. While the findings suggest depression as a co-morbidity, attention needs to be given to a comparatively small high-stable depressive symptoms trajectory group with elevated risk of cognitive decline in their 60s.

Memory training in older adults with mild cognitive impairment: Positive effects are found five years after MEMO training compared to control intervention

AbstractBackgroundCognitive training was found to have a positive effect on the memory of healthy older adults, including long‐term benefits (Rebok et al, 2014). This finding offers hope that cognitive training could contribute to prevention approaches. However, little is known regarding the long‐term benefits of cognitive training in older adults with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), many of whom are in the early phase of Alzheimer’s disease. In a prior randomized controlled trial (Belleville et al, 2018), we reported a short‐term benefit of cognitive training on the delayed recall of older adults with MCI. The objective of this study was to assess the impact five years later.MethodThis is the five‐year follow‐up of a single‐blind randomized controlled trial (MEMO+). Participants with amnestic MCI were randomized to memory training or an active (psychosocial intervention) or passive (no‐contact) control condition. Interventions were provided in small groups over eight two‐hour sessions with a single booster session offered three months following training. In the initial study, participants were assessed post‐training, as well as three and six months after the intervention. The 127 participants with MCI, who completed the 6‐month post‐training assessment, were contacted five years post‐training. Primary outcomes included a 12‐word free recall task, a self‐reported strategy used in everyday life, and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment screening test (MoCA). Participants randomized to cognitive training were compared to those randomized to the control conditions.ResultParticipants with MCI, who were randomized to the cognitive training condition, showed a reduced 5‐year decline on the delayed recall task when compared to participants in the control conditions. Participants randomized to the cognitive training condition also demonstrated superior delayed recall and MoCA performance than those in the control condition, five years post‐training. There were no differences on self‐reported strategy use.ConclusionThe positive effect of cognitive training was found five years later on measures of delayed memory and global cognitive status in individuals with MCI. This indicates that the use of cognitive training is a valid preventive approach and has potential to delay the onset of dementia in at‐risk individuals.

Machine learning for the prediction of amyloid positivity in amnestic mild cognitive impairment

AbstractBackgroundAmnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) patients with amyloid (Aβ) deposition have worse prognosis than those without Aβ deposition and are candidates for clinical trials of anti‐Aβ drugs. In this regard, Aβ evaluation in aMCI patients is important for predicting conversion to Alzheimer’s disease. However, Aβ evaluation through amyloid positron emission tomography (PET) is limited due to high cost and safety issues. We therefore aimed to develop and validate two different prediction models of Aβ positivity for aMCI using optimal interpretable machine learning (ML) approaches utilizing multimodal markers.MethodWe recruited 529 aMCI patients from multiple centres who underwent Aβ PET. We trained ML algorithms using a training cohort (324 aMCI from Samsung medical center) with two‐phase modelling: model 1 included age, gender, education, diabetes, hypertension, apolipoprotein E genotype, and neuropsychological test scores; model 2 included the same variables as model 1 with additional MRI features. We used four‐fold cross‐validation during the modelling and evaluated the model on an external validation cohort (187 aMCI from the other centres).ResultModel 1 showed good accuracy (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUROC] 0·837) in cross‐validation, and fair accuracy (AUROC 0·765) in external validation. The addition of MRI features to the model 1 to create model 2 led to improvements in the prediction performance. Consequently, model 2 showed good accuracy (AUROC 0·892) in cross validation. Apolipoprotein E genotype, delayed recall task scores, and interaction between cortical thickness in the temporal region and hippocampal volume were the most important predictors of Aβ positivity.ConclusionOur results suggest that ML models are effective in predicting Aβ positivity at the individual level and could help the biomarker‐guided diagnosis of prodromal AD.

The age-related positivity effect: forgetting the negative and/or remembering the positive? An inter-task study.

A growing number of studies have shown that when compared to younger adults, older adults are better at recalling positive information than negative information. However, it is not yet clear whether this age-related positivity effect relies on a greater ability to recall positive information or on a decreased ability to recall negative information. We therefore aimed to study the specific mechanisms underlying the age-related positivity effect using different memory tasks. We used an emotional word memory paradigm including immediate free recall, recognition, and delayed free recall tasks. Forty-five young adults (m = 20.0 years) and 45 older adults (m = 69.2 years) participated, all of whom were native French speakers. Thirty-six French low-arousal words (12 positve, 12, negative, 12 neutral) were selected from an emotional lexical database (Gobin et al. 2017) and divided into three equal groups of positive, neutral and negative terms. For the recognition task, 36 new words were selected. The results show that the age-related positivity effect specifically depended on a decrease in negativity preference (i.e., the comparison between negative and neutral words) in older adults, in comparison with younger adults, both in the immediate and delayed free recall tasks. In these tasks, younger adults recalled more negative than neutral words, whereas there was no difference in older adults. During the recognition task, no age-related positivity effect was observed. The results also show that, for the immediate recall task, the greater the memory ability of older adults, the lower their negativity preference. This correlation was not significant in the delayed recall task. These results suggest that, when compared with younger adults, older adults disengage from processing negative words that require costly cognitive processes. A low negativity preference indicates that memory abilities are well-maintained. The results are discussed within the framework of socio-emotional selectivity theory.

DETERMINANTS OF IMMEDIATE AND DELAYED RECALL PERFORMANCE FOLLOWING PEDIATRIC CONCUSSION

Background:The assessment of cognitive functioning, including attention, memory, and concentration is one component of concussion evaluation.1-3 Immediate and delayed recall tasks are clinical assessments of cognitive functioning which evaluate memory performance post-injury.2 These tasks require patients to verbally recall as many items as possible from a word list both immediately after the list is administered and following a 5-minute delay.2 While previous studies have used a 5-word recall list (SCAT3),4 few have investigated the determinants of performance using a 10-word recall list (SCAT5).Purpose:The purpose of the investigation was to identify demographic, injury, and clinical test characteristics associated with immediate and delayed recall performance using the SCAT5 10-word recall test.Methods:We conducted a retrospective chart review collecting demographic (age, sex, history of concussion, relevant medical history), injury [time of clinical presentation, loss of consciousness (LOS), neuroimaging], and clinical (symptom inventory, m-BESS, tandem gait) characteristics, as well as immediate and delayed recall performance on a 10-word list.Results:Patients seen within 14 days of concussion (n=125; 15.2±1.6 years of age; 45% female; evaluated 6.9±3.4 days post-injury) were included in the analysis. Patients 15 years or older performed significantly better on both immediate and delayed recall tasks than those younger than 15 years of age (Table 1). In addition, patients who reported a diagnosis of ADD or ADHD accurately recalled fewer items during the delayed recall task (Table 1). No injury characteristics were associated with better or worse memory performance (Table 2). Patients who performed better on immediate recall reported fewer symptoms, made fewer m-BESS errors, and performed better on cognitive tasks during dual-task tandem gait (Table 3 & 4).Conclusion:Our data indicate immediate and delayed recall performance is associated with age, symptom severity, balance, and cognitive accuracy in tandem gait. Specifically, patients younger than 15 years of age and those reporting higher symptom severities demonstrated worse performance on both immediate and delayed recall tasks. Furthermore, patients reporting ADD/ADHD did not demonstrate a performance difference on immediate recall relative to peers but performed significantly worse during delayed recall testing. Additional patient characteristics of sex, concussion history, timing of clinical presentation, and injury characteristics (LOC or need for neuroimaging) were not associated with immediate and delayed recall performance. As such, clinicians using the SCAT5 word recall test during concussion evaluation should consider these patient characteristics when interpreting memory performance.

Musical instrument engagement across the life course and episodic memory in late life: An analysis of 60 years of longitudinal data from the Wisconsin Longitudinal Study.

BackgroundAs the global burden of dementia increases, the absence of treatment underscores the need for identification of factors that may improve cognitive reserve–the ability to stave off cognitive decline in old age. The beneficial association between musical instrument engagement and episodic memory has been identified in children, young adults, and older adults. Yet, previous studies in musical instrument engagement have rarely examined the potential for adolescence and adulthood exposures to independently improve cognition, nor have they been linked with the rate of memory decline over time in older adults. We investigated whether adolescent musical instrument engagement and continued musical instrument engagement over the adult life course were separately associated with higher episodic memory, as well as rate of decline in a large longitudinal cohort.MethodsData were from a prospective cohort of high school graduates from 1957. High school music engagement (HSME) was ascertained through graduate yearbooks and assessed as membership in musical performance groups. A questionnaire was used to assess musical engagement through adulthood (MEA) at ages 35, 55, and 65. The episodic memory score was composed of immediate and delayed recall task scores, and was assessed when participants were aged approximately 65 and 72 years old among 5,718 individuals. Linear mixed models were used to assess the association between music, and memory performance and decline over time.ResultsOf high school graduates who participated in the study, 38.1% played music in high school, and 21.1% played music in adulthood. While musical engagement was more common in those who played in childhood, 40% of those who played continuously as an adult did not play in high school. High HSME (B = 0.348, p = 0.049) and continuous MEA (B = 0.424, p = 0.012) were associated with higher memory scores at age 65 after covariate adjustment. When examining memory decline, the benefits of high HSME decreased over time (B = -0.435, p = 0.048), while the rate of decline did not differ between MEA groups. Exploratory models revealed differential benefits for HSME and immediate recall, and MEA and delayed recall.ConclusionThis study provides further evidence that musical engagement in childhood or adulthood is associated with non-musical cognitive reserve. These two exposures may act differentially in different domains of episodic memory. Further work is needed to determine the relationship between musicianship and the rate of cognitive decline.

How Does Cochlear Implantation Lead to Improvements on a Cognitive Screening Measure?

Purpose Cognitive screening tools to identify patients at risk for cognitive deficits are frequently used by clinicians who work with aging populations in hearing health care. Although some studies show improvements in performance on cognitive screening exams when hearing loss intervention is provided in the form of a hearing aid or cochlear implant (CI), it is worth examining whether these improvements are attributable to increased auditory access to test items. This study aimed to examine whether performance and pass rate on a cognitive screening measure, the Montréal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), improve as a result of CI, whether improved performance on auditory-based test items drives changes in MoCA performance, and whether postoperative MoCA performance relates to post-CI speech perception ability. Method Data were collected in adult CI candidates pre-implantation and 6 months postimplantation to examine the effect of intervention on MoCA performance. Participants were 77 CI users between the ages of 55 and 85 years. Participants completed the MoCA, administered audiovisually, and speech perception testing with monosyllabic (CNC) words at both intervals. Results Compared to 31 participants pre-operatively, 45 participants passed the MoCA postoperatively, which was a significant difference in pass rate. An improvement in MoCA scores could be attributed primarily to improvement in the "Delayed Recall" test domain, which was auditory based. Post-CI MoCA performance was related to post-CI CNC speech perception performance. Conclusions Improved performance and pass rates were demonstrated on the traditional MoCA test of cognitive screening from before to 6 months after CI. Improvements could primarily be attributed to better performance on a delayed recall task dependent on auditory access, and post-CI MoCA scores were related to post-CI speech perception abilities. Further studies are needed to investigate the application of cognitive screening tools in patients receiving hearing loss interventions, and these interventions' impact on patients' real-world functioning.

Relation of Atrial Fibrillation to Cognitive Decline (from the REasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke [REGARDS] Study)

The association of atrial fibrillation (AF) with cognitive function remains unclear, especially among racially/geographically diverse populations. This analysis included 25,980 black and white adults, aged 48+, from the national REasons for Geographic and Racial Differences in Stroke (REGARDS) cohort, free from cognitive impairment and stroke at baseline. Baseline AF was identified by self-reported medical history or electrocardiogram (ECG). Cognitive testing was conducted yearly with the Six Item Screener (SIS) to define impairment and at 2-year intervals to assess decline on: animal naming and letter fluency, Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), Word List Learning (WLL) and Delayed Recall tasks (WLD). Multivariable regression models estimated the relationships between AF and baseline impairment and time to cognitive impairment. Models were adjusted sequentially for age, sex, race, geographic region, and education, then cardiovascular risk factors and finally incident stroke. AF was present in 2,168 (8.3%) participants at baseline. AF was associated with poorer baseline performance on measures of: semantic fluency (p<0.01); global cognitive performance (MoCA, p<0.01); and WLD (p<0.01). During a mean follow-up of 8.06 years, steeper declines in list learning were observed among participants with AF (p<0.03) which remained significant after adjusting for cardiovascular risk factors (p<0.04) and incident stroke (p<0.03). Effect modification by race, sex and incident stroke on AF and cognitive decline were also detected. In conclusion, AF was associated with poorer baseline cognitive performance across multiple domains and incident cognitive impairment in this bi-racial cohort. Additional adjustment for cardiovascular risk factors attenuated these relations with the exception of learning.

Reading From Multiple Documents: The Role of Text Availability and Question Type

ABSTRACTThe current information society requires people to handle information from different sources, which entails specific skills beyond those needed to comprehend and use information from a single text. Given the relevance of becoming a competent reader in functional reading scenarios, it is crucial to examine how contextual‐, task‐, and individual‐related factors may influence multiple‐documents question‐answering activities, a key issue for assessment and instruction. In this study, we examined the influence of text availability and question type in students’ question‐answering performance and the moderator effect of students’ reading skill. Seventy secondary school students read three expository texts about a history topic. Next, they performed a concurrent question‐answering task consisting of a set of intra‐ and intertext questions they answered either with or without the texts available. Finally, participants performed a free‐recall task after a 24‐hour delay without access to the learning materials. Results showed higher performance scores in the intratext questions when the text was available than when it was not. However, the superiority of text availability disappeared in the delayed recall task. Additionally, skilled readers who had the texts available scored higher in the concurrent question‐answering task and, moreover, recalled more ideas in the recall task. These findings shed light on how contextual‐ (i.e., text availability), task‐ (i.e., question type), and student‐related (i.e., reading skill) factors may influence both adolescents’ question answering from multiple documents and their recall. The implications of these findings for the science of reading and the educational practice are discussed.

Machine Learning for the Prediction of Amyloid Positivity in Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment

Amyloid-β (Aβ) evaluation in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) patients is important for predicting conversion to Alzheimer's disease. However, Aβ evaluation through Aβ positron emission tomography (PET) is limited due to high cost and safety issues. We therefore aimed to develop and validate prediction models of Aβ positivity for aMCI using optimal interpretable machine learning (ML) approaches utilizing multimodal markers. We recruited 529 aMCI patients from multiple centers who underwent Aβ PET. We trained ML algorithms using a training cohort (324 aMCI from Samsung medical center) with two-phase modelling: model 1 included age, gender, education, diabetes, hypertension, apolipoprotein E genotype, and neuropsychological test scores; model 2 included the same variables as model 1 with additional MRI features. We used four-fold cross-validation during the modelling and evaluated the models on an external validation cohort (187 aMCI from the other centers). Model 1 showed good accuracy (area under the receiver operating characteristic curve [AUROC] 0.837) in cross-validation, and fair accuracy (AUROC 0.765) in external validation. Model 2 led to improvement in the prediction performance with good accuracy (AUROC 0.892) in cross validation compared to model 1. Apolipoprotein E genotype, delayed recall task scores, and interaction between cortical thickness in the temporal region and hippocampal volume were the most important predictors of Aβ positivity. Our results suggest that ML models are effective in predicting Aβ positivity at the individual level and could help the biomarker-guided diagnosis of prodromal AD.

The age-related positivity effect: forgetting the negative and/or remembering the positive? An inter-task study

A growing number of studies have shown that, compared to young adults, older adults better remember positive information than negative information. However, it is not clear whether this age-related positivity effect relies on an increase in positive information memory and/or on a decrease in negative information memory. Thus, we aimed to study the specific mechanisms underlying the age-related positivity effect in different memory tasks. To do so, we used an emotional word memory paradigm including immediate free recall, recognition and delayed free recall tasks. Forty-five young adults (m =20.0 years) and 45 older adults (m = 69.2 years) native French speakers participated. Thirty-six low French words, including 12 negative (e.g. égout), 12 positive (e.g. lagune) and 12 neutral (e.g. notion) words were selected from an emotional lexical database (Gobin et al. 2017). For the recognition task, 36 new words were selected. The results showed that the age-related positivity effect specifically depended on a decrease in negativity preference (i.e. the comparison between negative and neutral words) in older adults, in comparison with young adults, both in immediate and delayed free recall tasks. Indeed, in these tasks, young adults recalled more negative than neutral words whereas there was no difference in older adults. In recognition task, no age-related positivity effect has been observed. Moreover, the results showed that, in immediate recall, the higher the older adults memory abilities, the lower their negativity preference. This correlation was not significant in delayed recall. These results suggest that, when compared with young adults, older adults disengage from negative words processing through costly cognitive processes. A small magnitude of negativity preference would indicate good maintenance of memory abilities. Results are discussed in the framework of the socioemotional selectivity theory.

Recollection and consistency of intrusions for normal, MCI and impaired adults on a word list recall task

AbstractBackgroundA word list recall test was administered to subjects ages 48‐100 for the purposes of prescreening for Alzheimer’s research. The test involved the presentation of 10 words with an immediate recall task, a reviewed recall task, and a delayed recall task.MethodThe test was administered to 3612 subjects who were divided into three groups based on cognitive scores: Healthy Memory (n=2341), MCI (n=1066), and Impaired (n=205). Number of intrusions were analyzed for each of the immediate recall task (Healthy=125, MCI=83, Impaired=25), reviewed recall task (Healthy=68, MCI=81, Impaired=28), and delayed recall task (Healthy=114, MCI=117, Impaired=25). Repetition of intrusions were compared in the delayed recall task.ResultsThe MCI group was more statistically likely to have intrusions than the healthy group (tcrit=1.65,tstat=6.70) and the impaired group was more likely to have intrusions than the MCI group (tcrit=1.65, tstat=1.70). On the delayed task, 31.68% of the healthy subjects repeated intrusions from their immediate or reviewed recall trials, while 40.17% of the MCI subjects repeated intrusions from their earlier recall trials. In the Impaired group, 44% of the intrusions were novel words that were not recalled during the immediate or review sessions. Rate of intrusions was also analyzed between the immediate and reviewed recall, with the finding that intrusions drop from 5.33% to 2.90% in the Healthy group, while rate of intrusions remains constant with the MCI group (7.79% and 7.60%) and the Impaired group (12.20% and 13.66%).ConclusionThese findings indicate that subjects with healthy memory have a lower instance of repeating intrusions after the second presentation (review) of the word list than subjects with mild cognitive impairment. It may be inferred that subjects with healthy memory are better able to recognize, after review, that their initial intrusion was not accurate and to store this information for the delayed trial. MCI subjects not only had a higher incidence of including intrusions following the review, they also had a higher instance of repeating earlier intrusions during delayed recall than the healthy memory or the impaired groups.

&lt;i&gt;Foxes, deer&lt;/i&gt;, and &lt;i&gt;hedgehogs&lt;/i&gt;: The recall of focus alternatives in Vietnamese

In tonal languages, the role of intonation in information-structuring has yet to be fully investigated. Intuitively, one would expect intonation to play only a small role in expressing communicative functions. However, experimental studies with Vietnamese native speakers show that intonation contours vary across different contexts and are used to mark certain types of information, for example, focus (Jannedy, 2007). In non-tonal languages (e.g., English), the marking of focus by intonation can influence the processing of focus alternatives (Fraundorf, Watson, & Benjamin, 2010). If Vietnamese also uses intonation to mark focus, the question arises whether the behavioral consequences of prosodic focus marking in Vietnamese are comparable to languages such as English or German. To test this, we replicate a study on memory for focus alternatives, originally carried out in German (Koch & Spalek, in progress), with Vietnamese language stimuli. In the original study, memory for focus alternatives was improved in a delayed recall task for focused elements produced with contrastive intonation in female speakers. Here, we replicate this finding with Northern Vietnamese native speakers: Contrastive intonation seems to improve later recall for focus alternatives in Northern Vietnamese, but only for female participants, in line with the findings by Koch and Spalek (in progress). These results indicate that prosodic focus marking in Vietnamese makes alternatives to the focused element more salient. Publisher's Note: A corrigendum relating to this article can be found at http://doi.org/10.5334/labphon.323.

Recall and Recognition in Alzheimer's Disease and Frontotemporal Dementia.

It has long been debated whether performance on recall and recognition tests depends on the same or different memory systems and whether performance on these two tasks is dissociated in clinical populations. According to Dual process theories of recall, performance on recall and recognition tests dissociates in the relative reliance on frontal lobe related activities; in fact, the recall test requires more strategic retrieval of memoranda than the recognition task. By contrast, Dual process theories of recognition posit that performance on these tests differs in the relative contribution of recollection and familiarity memory processes in the two tasks: both recollection and familiarity contribute to recognition judgments, but only recollection supports recall performance. The aim of this study was to clarify the cognitive processes involved in recall and recognition in patients with dementia. We administered a 15-word recall task followed by a yes/no recognition paradigm to 28 patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD), 22 patients with the behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia (bvFTD), and 45 normal controls (NCs). Results showed that on the delayed recall task, bvFTD patients performed much better than AD patients but the two groups did not differ on any index of recognition performance. The present data support the hypothesis that the performance of the two groups is expression of the different reliance on recollection (more impaired in the AD than in the bvFTD group) and familiarity (similarly impaired in the two groups) in performance on recall and recognition tasks.

Reduced Attentional Control in Older Adults Leads to Deficits in Flexible Prioritization of Visual Working Memory.

Visual working memory (VWM) resources have been shown to be flexibly distributed according to item priority. This flexible allocation of resources may depend on attentional control, an executive function known to decline with age. In this study, we sought to determine how age differences in attentional control affect VWM performance when attention is flexibly allocated amongst targets of varying priority. Participants performed a delayed-recall task wherein item priority was varied. Error was modelled using a three-component mixture model to probe different aspects of performance (precision, guess-rate, and non-target errors). The flexible resource model offered a good fit to the data from both age groups, but older adults showed consistently lower precision and higher guess rates. Importantly, when demands on flexible resource allocation were highest, older adults showed more non-target errors, often swapping in the item that had a higher priority at encoding. Taken together, these results suggest that the ability to flexibly allocate attention in VWM is largely maintained with age, but older adults are less precise overall and sometimes swap in salient, but no longer relevant, items possibly due to their lessened ability to inhibit previously attended information.

Sex Differences in Work-Stress Memory Bias and Stress Hormones.

Mental health problems related to chronic stress in workers appear to be sex-specific. Psychosocial factors related to work–life balance partly explain these sex differences. In addition, physiological markers of stress can provide critical information on the mechanisms explaining how chronic stress gets “under the skull” to increase vulnerability to mental health disorders in working men and women. Stress hormones access the brain and modulate attentional and memory process in favor of threatening information. In the present study, we tested whether male and female workers present a memory bias towards work-stress related information, and whether this bias is associated with concentrations of stress hormones in reactivity to a laboratory stressor (reactive levels) and samples taken in participants’ workday (diurnal levels). In total, 201 participants (144 women) aged between 18 and 72 years underwent immediate and delayed recall tasks with a 24-word list, split as a function of valence (work-stress, positive, neutral). Participants were exposed to a psychosocial stressor in between recalls. Reactivity to stress was measured with saliva samples before and after the stressor. Diurnal cortisol was also measured with five saliva samples a day, during 2 workdays. Our exploratory results showed that men presented greater cortisol reactivity to stress than women, while women recalled more positive and neutral words than men. No sex difference was detected on the recall of work-stress words, before or after exposure to stress. These results do not support the hypothesis of a sex-specific cognitive bias as an explanatory factor for sex differences in stress-related mental health disorders in healthy male and female workers. However, it is possible that such a work-stress bias is present in individuals who have developed a mental-health disorder related to workplace stress or who have had one in the recent past. Consequently, future studies could use our stress memory bias task to assess this and other hypotheses in diverse working populations.

A comprehensive examination of the memory profile of youth with Down syndrome in comparison to typically developing peers

ABSTRACT Down syndrome (DS) is associated with significant memory deficits beyond overall global cognitive impairment. Although a number of studies have examined memory abilities in adults and teens with DS, very few studies have examined memory abilities in children with DS. Additionally, research has yet to examine prospective memory (i.e., remembering to carry out an action in the future) in youth with DS. Consequently, the current study aimed to comprehensively examine the memory profile, including learning, immediate recall, delayed recall and prospective memory, of youth with DS (n = 22, age M = 11.43) in comparison to typically developing, mental-age (MA) matched children (n = 20, age M = 5.04) Consistent with past research, the results indicated that youth with DS performed significantly below MA-expectations on tasks of immediate verbal recall, learning across trials, and prospective memory, and there was a trend toward youth with DS performing below MA-expectations on delayed recall tasks. However, youth with DS did not differ significantly from MA-matched peers on immediate visual recall, rate of learning across trials, or proportion of items recalled on verbal and visual memory tasks following a delay (i.e., proportion relative to their own recall performance prior to the delay). These results highlight the relative strengths and challenges experienced by youth with DS on different learning and memory tasks. The implications of these findings for educators and caregivers are discussed.

Performance on the standard and hearing-impaired Montreal Cognitive Assessment in cochlear implant users.

Commonly used cognitive screening tools were not originally developed for patients with hearing loss (HL) and rely heavily on the ability to hear the instructions and test stimuli. Recently, the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) was modified for use with hearing-impaired populations (ie, HI-MoCA). In order to investigate the clinical utility of the HI-MoCA, we assessed performance between the standard MoCA and HI-MoCA among postlingually deafened cochlear implant (CI) users. We administered the standard MoCA and HI-MoCA to 21 CI users and compared their performance. We assessed differences in pass/fail status when items from the attention and language sections and the delayed recall task were removed. There was no significant difference in performance between the standard MoCA and HI-MoCA. Participants scored higher on both test versions when the delayed recall task was removed. Participants also performed better on the delayed recall task on the HI-MoCA than on the standard MoCA. While our findings suggest that the modality of presentation for the MoCA does not influence overall performance for postlingually deafened CI users, visual presentation of stimuli impacted performance on delayed recall. Furthermore, irrespective of presentation modality, our participants scored higher on both MoCA versions when the delayed recall task was removed. Clinically, modifications to the presentation of the MoCA might not be necessary for CI users; however, clinicians should be aware that the delayed recall task is inherently harder for these patients.