NPAS3 exonic SNP genotype is linked to working memory performance in healthy young adults

2018 ◽  
Vol 265 ◽  
pp. 263-264
Author(s):  
Leiah M. Luoma ◽  
Georgina Macintyre ◽  
Philip G. Tibbo ◽  
T. Cameron Wild ◽  
Ian Colman ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Memory Performance

scholarly journals Negative Effects of Embodiment in a Visuo-Spatial Working Memory Task in Children, Young Adults, and Older Adults

2021 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gianluca Amico ◽  
Sabine Schaefer
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Spatial Information ◽  
Spatial Working Memory ◽  
Cognitive Task ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Negative Effects

Studies examining the effect of embodied cognition have shown that linking one’s body movements to a cognitive task can enhance performance. The current study investigated whether concurrent walking while encoding or recalling spatial information improves working memory performance, and whether 10-year-old children, young adults, or older adults (Mage = 72 years) are affected differently by embodiment. The goal of the Spatial Memory Task was to encode and recall sequences of increasing length by reproducing positions of target fields in the correct order. The nine targets were positioned in a random configuration on a large square carpet (2.5 m × 2.5 m). During encoding and recall, participants either did not move, or they walked into the target fields. In a within-subjects design, all possible combinations of encoding and recall conditions were tested in counterbalanced order. Contrary to our predictions, moving particularly impaired encoding, but also recall. These negative effects were present in all age groups, but older adults’ memory was hampered even more strongly by walking during encoding and recall. Our results indicate that embodiment may not help people to memorize spatial information, but can create a dual-task situation instead.

scholarly journals Nicotine Effects on White Matter Microstructure in Young Adults

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (1) ◽  
pp. 10-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Megan M Kangiser ◽  
Alicia M Thomas ◽  
Christine M Kaiver ◽  
Krista M Lisdahl
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
White Matter ◽  
Fractional Anisotropy ◽  
Sustained Attention ◽  
Verbal Memory ◽  
Diffusion Tensor ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Mean Diffusivity ◽  
White Matter Microstructure

Abstract Objective Nicotine use is widely prevalent among youth, and is associated with white matter microstructural changes as measured by diffusion tensor imaging (DTI). In adults, nicotine use is generally associated with lower fractional anisotropy (FA), but in adolescents/young adults (≤30 years), microstructure appears healthier, indicated by higher FA. This cross-sectional study examined associations between nicotine use and white matter microstructure using fractional anisotropy (FA), mean diffusivity (MD), axial diffusivity (AD), and radial diffusivity (RD) in young adults. Methods Fifty-three participants (18 nicotine users [10 female]/35 controls [17 female]) ages 18–25 underwent MRI scan, neuropsychological battery, toxicology screening, and drug use interview. Nicotine group associations with FA and MD were examined in various white matter tracts. In significant tracts, AD and RD were measured. Exploratory correlations were conducted between significant tracts and verbal memory and sustained attention/working memory performance. Results Nicotine users exhibited significantly lower FA than controls in the left anterior thalamic radiation, left inferior longitudinal fasciculus, left superior longitudinal fasciculus—temporal, and left uncinate fasciculus. In these tracts, AD and RD did not differ, nor did MD differ in any tract. White matter quality was positively correlated with sustained attention/working memory performance. Conclusions Cigarette smoking may disrupt white matter microstructure. These results are consistent with adult studies, but inconsistent with adolescent/young adult studies, likely due to methodological and sample age differences. Further studies should examine longitudinal effects of nicotine use on white matter microstructure in a larger sample.

scholarly journals Opposite reactions to loss incentive by young and older adults: Insights from diffusion modeling

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hyesue Jang ◽  
Richard Lewis ◽  
Cindy Lustig
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Retention Interval ◽  
Drift Rate ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Later Life ◽  
Self Report ◽  
Memory Representation ◽  
Diffusion Modeling

The prospect of loss becomes more salient in later life, and the opportunity to avoid loss is often used to motivate older adults. We examined the effect of loss incentive on working memory in young and older adults. Diffusion-modeling analyses, manipulation of task parameters, and self-report measures identified which aspects of cognitive-motivational processing were most affected within each group. As predicted, loss incentive increased working memory performance and self-reported motivation in young adults, but, consistent with prior work, had the opposite effect in older adults. Diffusion-modeling analyses suggested the primary effect was on the quality of the memory representation (drift rate). Incentive did not interact with retention interval or the number of items in the memory set. Instead, longer retention intervals led to better performance, potentially by improved differentiation between studied items and the unstudied probe as a function of temporal context. Overall, the results do not support theories suggesting that older adults are either more motivated by loss or that they ignore it. Instead, the loss incentive increased young adults' performance and subjective motivation, with opposite effects for older adults. The specific impact on drift rate and lack of interactions with set size or retention interval suggest that rather than affecting load-dependent or strategic processes, the effects occur at a relatively global level related to overall task engagement.

Functional brain network abnormalities during verbal working memory performance in adolescents and young adults with dyslexia

2010 ◽  
Vol 48 (1) ◽  
pp. 309-318 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Christian Wolf ◽  
Fabio Sambataro ◽  
Christina Lohr ◽  
Claudia Steinbrink ◽  
Claudia Martin ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Verbal Working Memory ◽  
Brain Network ◽  
Adolescents And Young Adults ◽  
Functional Brain ◽  
Functional Brain Network

scholarly journals Network dynamics predict improvement in working memory performance following donepezil administration in healthy young adults

NeuroImage ◽  
2014 ◽  
Vol 88 ◽  
pp. 228-241 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Reches ◽  
I. Laufer ◽  
K. Ziv ◽  
G. Cukierman ◽  
K. McEvoy ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Network Dynamics

scholarly journals Exploring the effects of demonstration and enactment in facilitating recall of instructions in working memory

2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 400-410 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard J. Allen ◽  
Liam J. B. Hill ◽  
Lucy H. Eddy ◽  
Amanda H. Waterman
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Physical Environment ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Daily Activities ◽  
Successful Completion ◽  
Memory Research ◽  
Verbal Recall ◽  
Motor Processes ◽  
Instruction Sequences

AbstractAcross the lifespan the ability to follow instructions is essential for the successful completion of a multitude of daily activities. This ability will often rely on the storage and processing of information in working memory, and previous research in this domain has found that self-enactment at encoding or observing other-enactment at encoding (demonstration) improves performance at recall. However, no working memory research has directly compared these manipulations. Experiment 1 explored the effects of both self-enactment and demonstration on young adults’ (N=48) recall of action-object instruction sequences (e.g. ‘spin the circle, tap the square’). Both manipulations improved recall, with demonstration providing relatively larger boosts to performance across conditions. More detailed analyses suggested that this improvement was driven by improving the representations of actions, rather than objects, in these action-object sequences. Experiment 2 (N=24) explored this further, removing the objects from the physical environment and comparing partial demonstration (i.e. action-only or object-only) with no or full demonstration. The results showed that partial demonstration only benefitted features that were demonstrated, while full demonstration improved memory for actions, objects and their pairings. Overall these experiments indicate how self-enactment, and particularly demonstration, can benefit verbal recall of instruction sequences through the engagement of visuo-motor processes that provide additional forms of coding to support working memory performance.

Neural correlates of working memory performance in adolescents and young adults with dyslexia

2008 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 640-648 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nenad Vasic ◽  
Christina Lohr ◽  
Claudia Steinbrink ◽  
Claudia Martin ◽  
Robert Christian Wolf
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Neural Correlates ◽  
Adolescents And Young Adults

scholarly journals The role of reduced working memory resources in the associative deficit of older adults

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Yoko Hara
Keyword(s):  
Older Adults ◽  
Working Memory ◽  
Young Adults ◽  
Associative Memory ◽  
Secondary Task ◽  
Memory Performance ◽  
Secondary Tasks ◽  
Online Processing ◽  
Associative Deficit ◽  
Processing Resources

Previous research indicates that older adults show problems with remembering associations compared to young adults, yet they remember single pieces of information about as well as young adults do (see Naveh-Benjamin, 2000). The purpose of the present study is to investigate whether reduced working memory (WM) resources affect associative memory and whether such a reduction can account for older adults’ associative deficit. Three experiments investigated whether we can simulate an associative deficit in young adults by using secondary tasks that increase their WM loads (either via increasing storage or processing demands of the secondary task) during a primary task in which they were required to learn name-face pairs and then remember the names, the faces, and the name-face associations. Results show that reducing both the storage and the processing resources of WM each produced an associative deficit in young adults. However, further increasing the demands of the secondary task for WM processing resources gradually increased the size of the associative deficit, whereas increasing the demands of the secondary task for WM storage resources did not differentially affect associative memory performance. Furthermore, younger adults with low-WM span or low-online processing showed an associative deficit under full attention conditions compared to young adults with high-WM span or high-online processing. High-WM span/processing individuals also showed an associative deficit when the processing or storage demands on WM increased. In summary, the present studies showed that one possible reason older adults have an associative deficit is a reduction in their WM resources, especially those related to WM processing.

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