Recent research reveals the impact of a specialized type of cognitive training developed by a UAB expert.A study published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Translational Research & Clinical Interventions shows that one type of cognitive training can result in a significant reduction in long-term risk of Alzheimer’s and related dementias. The University of Alabama at Birmingham served as one of six national sites contributing 20 years of data to the study.
Karlene Ball, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Psychology and one of the study’s principal investigators, assisted in evaluating data focused on how one specific type of cognitive training can affect the risk of Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias, or ADRD.
Participants of the study were randomly assigned to one of three cognitive training groups — speed, memory or reasoning training — or to a control group. Roughly half of the people in each group were assigned to participate in “booster” training to determine whether additional training at a later time would make a difference on the risk of ADRD.
Reasoning training involves training a participant’s ability to solve problems that follow a pattern, like a number series. Memory training focused on remembering the order of sequences or recalling images and texts, and speed training used computerized exercises to help participants process visual information more quickly and accurately. The speed training used in the study was developed by Ball and Daniel Roenker, another researcher on the study.
Participants who completed speed-of-processing cognitive training and follow-up “booster” sessions experienced a 25 percent lower risk of being diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias over two decades, compared with those who did not receive the training.
“Speed training was designed to improve the speed and accuracy of visual information processing, while expanding the visual area over which a person could pay attention and make rapid decisions,” Ball said.
There was no statistically notable benefit of memory or reasoning training on the diagnosis of ADRD. Ball says this may be due to the adaptability of each training method.
“Speed training adapted its level of challenge for each participant’s individual performance level,” Ball said. “Additionally, speed training drives implicit learning, while memory training and reasoning training drive explicit learning.”
Implicit learning is also called perceptual or non-declarative learning and can retain a skill for decades such a riding a bike.
“Speed training appears to work in the same way, driving a long-lasting, important brain change in the course of 10 to 22.5 hours of learning.” Ball said. “Training sought to maintain 75 percent correct performance throughout training, so the beginning level of difficulty varied across participants.”
ACTIVE study
The study’s results come from the ongoing Advanced Cognitive Training for Independent and Vital Elderly study, a large randomized trial organized and funded by the National Institutes of Health. The ACTIVE Study began participant enrollment in March 1998 and completed enrollment in October 1999. ACTIVE enrolled 2,832 generally healthy participants age 65 or older, with an average age of almost 74, at six research sites across the United States.
Participants engaged in a set of cognitive tests before training, immediately after training, and one, two, three, five and 10 years after training. For this 20-year follow-up, researchers accessed participants’ medical records to determine which participants were diagnosed over the 20-year follow-up period with ADRD. At the time of the 20-year follow-up, an average surviving participant would have been almost 94.
The success of speed training has led it to become widely available to the public. An updated version of the same speed training used in the ACTIVE study is now available as an exercise called Double Decision, accessible through the BrainHQ app or website.
ACTIVE is the first randomized controlled trial to show a benefit of any intervention in the risk of developing dementia.Learn more about the research and read the full study.