Towers of Hanoi and London: Is the Nonshared Variance Due to Differences in Task Administration?

2000 ◽  
Vol 90 (2) ◽  
pp. 562-572 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marilyn C. Welsh ◽  
Veronica Revilla ◽  
Dawn Strongin ◽  
Michelle Kepler

Although it has been assumed that the Tower of Hanoi and Tower of London are more or less interchangeable tasks dependent on executive function, a series of studies in our laboratory have indicated substantial nonshared variance between the performances on the two tasks. The purpose of the present study was to examine how much methods of administration, such as number of trials per problem, contribute to this nonshared variance. A new one-trial version of the Tower of Hanoi was developed to be identical to the Tower of London in four procedural characteristics. The one-trial version of the Tower of Hanoi was administered to 39 normal adults along with the traditional Tower of Hanoi and the Tower of London–Revised in two test sessions 5–7 weeks apart. The correlations between the two tasks were in the same range as found previously with the traditional task, indicating that administration differences do not account for the nonshared variance between the tasks. A reliability analysis of the one-trial tasks showed poor internal consistency. Also, the internal consistency of the 6-trial tower was artificially inflated by aspects of the administration and scoring procedures. Moreover, this task exhibited a ceiling effect on repeated testing. These results suggest that it would be of value to redesign the one-trial Tower of Hanoi systematically to increase its reliability and, potentially, its validity as a measure of executive functions.

Genes ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (8) ◽  
pp. 1108
Author(s):  
Lorena Joga-Elvira ◽  
Jennifer Martinez-Olmo ◽  
María-Luisa Joga ◽  
Carlos Jacas ◽  
Ana Roche-Martínez ◽  
...  

The aim of this research is to analyze the relationship between executive functions and adaptive behavior in girls with Fragile X syndrome (FXS) in the school setting. This study is part of a larger investigation conducted at the Hospital Parc Tauli in Sabadell. The sample consists of a total of 40 girls (26 with FXS and 14 control) aged 7–16 years, who were administered different neuropsychological tests (WISC-V, NEPSY-II, WCST, TOL) and questionnaires answered by teachers (ABAS-II, BRIEF 2, ADHD Rating Scale). The results show that there is a greater interaction between some areas of executive function (cognitive flexibility, auditory attention, and visual abstraction capacity) and certain areas of adaptive behavior (conceptual, practical, social, and total domains) in the FXS group than in the control group. These results suggest that an alteration in the executive functions was affecting the daily functioning of the girls with FXS to a greater extent.


1942 ◽  
Vol 60 (2) ◽  
pp. 223-224

I The Abbess of Syon has very courteously called my attention to an error in my article on Fontevraud, at page 34. The last sentence of the middle paragraph should read: The order of the Most Holy Saviour (Brigittines) was founded in Sweden in 1370; it professed the Rule of St Augustine, but with its own Constitutions; it comprised in each house nuns, to the number of sixty, monks, not to exceed seventeen, and eight lay brothers. H. F. CHETTLE. II ‘With respect to the reliquaries I leave you to follow your own judgment; but as the relicts ( sic) can no longer be exposed, I should be inclined to consider it useless to be at any expense about their cases.’—Such is the conclusion of a letter of Fr Ralph Ainsworth, Provincial of Canterbury, to Fr Anselm Lorymer, Procurator of the same province, dated 28th July, 1813. It is plainly an answer to a letter of Fr Lorymer's in which he had asked the Provincial's leave to spend some money in having cases made for certain reliquaries with their relics. These were, in all reasonable probability, some of the objects which were found early last century in a box at the distillery of Mr Marmaduke Langdale in Holborn (see an article in the Downside Review for October 1934, on ‘Relics and Plate from the Rosary Chapel’). The interest of the above extract is that it puts the opening of the box and discovery of its contents considerably earlier than had previously been conjectured; for there is no contemporary written evidence as to when and under what circumstances that took place. Fr Alphonsus Morrall gives the story on the testimony of persons living at the time, but without a precise date; he conjectured ‘about 1822’, probably because in or before 1823 Fr Lorymer had the reliquary of the piece of the Holy Cross made into a monstrance which he sent to Downside for the opening of the Old Chapel in July of that year. It was a reasonable guess; but it now appears that Mr Langdale's box, which contained relics and plate from the seventeenth-century Chapel of the Rosary in London, was opened at least nine years earlier. It is a pity that Fr Lorymer's letter cannot be traced either at Downside or at Ampleforth (to which house Fr Ainsworth belonged), for it is not unlikely that it gave some particulars as to the time and circumstances of this interesting discovery. All that is now known of the matter, with identification of some of the contents of the box, may be found in the article referred to above. It may be added, however, that the Mr Sidney mentioned in one of Fr Lorymer's letters (p. 600) is now identified from old letters with William Sidney, who was at Acton Burnell from 1799 to 1801, first as a commensalis and then as a novice. He left owing to ill health, but remained on friendly terms with the Benedictines. Fr Lorymer says that Sidney ‘met with some account of a relick of the Holy Cross which I think must be the one you have’ (i.e. at Downside). It is possible that he was the author of the article in the Catholic Miscellany for 1824 (though Dr Oliver gives the author as Fr Lorymer himself), for the account there given, from Panzani, of a relic of the Holy Cross found in the Tower of London, is evidently the same as that ‘met with’ by Mr Sidney: it is really quoted word for word from Dodd's History in, p. 41. But that relic is certainly not the one from Langdale's box sent to Downside by Fr Lorymer, for this latter was believed in Weldon's time to have belonged to Queen Mary and to have been rescued from her chapel by Abbot Feckenham after her death. R.H.C.


2015 ◽  
Vol 25 (62) ◽  
pp. 383-392
Author(s):  
Larissa de Oliveira e Ferreira ◽  
Daniela Sacramento Zanini ◽  
Alessandra Gotuzo Seabra

AbstractThe Tower of Hanoi is a tool used to evaluate executive functions. However, few studies describe what functions are evaluated in this test. This study investigates the executive functions, evaluated by the Tower of Hanoi (ToH), and the influence of gender, age and its relationship with intelligence. We evaluated 55 children and adolescents, between the ages of ten and 16, without diagnosed neuropsychiatric disorders. The results showed that the performance and time in to complete the Tower of Hanoi have no discriminative power when comparing age groups and sex; there was also no significant correlation found between the ToH and the execution quotient of the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children - Third Edition (WISC III), perceptual organization and the speed of processing. Only the subtest coding were positively related to the ToH, demonstrating that these instruments may be measuring related aspects of intelligence and executive functions, namely intelligence and working memory.


2017 ◽  
Vol 23 (7) ◽  
pp. 529-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabriel C. Araujo ◽  
Tanya N. Antonini ◽  
Vicki Anderson ◽  
Kathryn A. Vannatta ◽  
Christina G. Salley ◽  
...  

AbstractObjectives:This study examined whether children with distinct brain disorders show different profiles of strengths and weaknesses in executive functions, and differ from children without brain disorder.Methods:Participants were children with traumatic brain injury (N=82; 8–13 years of age), arterial ischemic stroke (N=36; 6–16 years of age), and brain tumor (N=74; 9–18 years of age), each with a corresponding matched comparison group consisting of children with orthopedic injury (N=61), asthma (N=15), and classmates without medical illness (N=68), respectively. Shifting, inhibition, and working memory were assessed, respectively, using three Test of Everyday Attention: Children’s Version (TEA-Ch) subtests: Creature Counting, Walk-Don’t-Walk, and Code Transmission. Comparison groups did not differ in TEA-Ch performance and were merged into a single control group. Profile analysis was used to examine group differences in TEA-Ch subtest scaled scores after controlling for maternal education and age.Results:As a whole, children with brain disorder performed more poorly than controls on measures of executive function. Relative to controls, the three brain injury groups showed significantly different profiles of executive functions. Importantly, post hoc tests revealed that performance on TEA-Ch subtests differed among the brain disorder groups.Conclusions:Results suggest that different childhood brain disorders result in distinct patterns of executive function deficits that differ from children without brain disorder. Implications for clinical practice and future research are discussed. (JINS, 2017,23, 529–538)


2014 ◽  
Vol 72 (12) ◽  
pp. 954-959 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrea Bandeira de Lima ◽  
Fernanda Moreira ◽  
Marleide da Mota Gomes ◽  
Heber Maia-Filho

Objective To compare the executive functions of children and adolescents with idiopathic epilepsy with a control group and to correlate with clinical data, intelligence and academic performance. Method Cross-sectional, descriptive and analytical study. Thirty-one cases and thirty-five controls were evaluated by the WCST (Wisconsin Card Sorting Test).The results were compared with clinical data (seizure type and frequency, disease duration and number of antiepileptic drugs used), IQ (WISC-III) and academic performance (APT). Results Patients with epilepsy had poorer executive function scores. There was no positive linear correlation between test scores and epilepsy variables. There was a positive association between academic performance and some executive function results. Conclusion Children with well controlled idiopathic epilepsy may show deficits in executive functions in spite of clinical variables. Those deficits may influence academic performance.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Younger ◽  
Kristine O'Laughlin ◽  
Joaquin Anguera ◽  
Silvia Bunge ◽  
Emilio Ferrer ◽  
...  

Abstract Executive functions (EFs) are linked to positive outcomes across the lifespan. Yet, methodological challenges have prevented rigorous understanding of the precise ways EFs are organized in childhood and how they develop over time. We introduce novel methods to address these challenges for both measuring and modeling EFs using a large, accelerated longitudinal dataset from a diverse sample of students in middle childhood (approximately ages 8 to 14; N = 1,286). Adaptive assessments allowed us to equate EF challenge across ages and a data-driven, network analytic approach revealed the evolving diversity of EFs while accounting for their unity. Our results suggest EF organization stabilizes around age 10, but continues refining through at least age 14. This approach brings new precision to EFs’ development by removing interpretative ambiguities associated with previous methodologies. By improving EF measurement, the field can move towards improving EF training, to provide a strong foundation for students’ success.


PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. e0247183
Author(s):  
Juliet Dunstone ◽  
Mark Atkinson ◽  
Catherine Grainger ◽  
Elizabeth Renner ◽  
Christine A. Caldwell

The use of ‘explicitly metacognitive’ learning strategies has been proposed as an explanation for uniquely human capacities for cumulative culture. Such strategies are proposed to rely on explicit, system-2 cognitive processes, to enable advantageous selective copying. To investigate the plausibility of this theory, we investigated participants’ ability to make flexible learning decisions, and their metacognitive monitoring efficiency, under executive function (EF) load. Adult participants completed a simple win-stay lose-shift (WSLS) paradigm task, intended to model a situation where presented information can be used to inform response choice, by copying rewarded responses and avoiding those that are unrewarded. This was completed alongside a concurrent switching task. Participants were split into three conditions: those that needed to use a selective copying, WSLS strategy, those that should always copy observed information, and those that should always do the opposite (Expt 1). Participants also completed a metacognitive monitoring task alongside the concurrent switching task (Expt 2). Conditions demanding selective strategies were more challenging than those requiring the use of one rule consistently. In addition, consistently copying was less challenging than consistently avoiding observed stimuli. Differences between selectively copying and always copying were hypothesised to stem from working memory requirements rather than the concurrent EF load. No impact of EF load was found on participants’ metacognitive monitoring ability. These results suggest that copying decisions are underpinned by the use of executive functions even at a very basic level, and that selective copying strategies are more challenging than a combination of their component parts. We found minimal evidence that selective copying strategies relied on executive functions any more than consistent copying or deviation. However, task experience effects suggested that ceiling effects could have been masking differences between conditions which might be apparent in other contexts, such as when observed information must be retained in memory.


eLife ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yong Dam Jeong ◽  
Keisuke Ejima ◽  
Kwang Su Kim ◽  
Shoya Iwanami ◽  
Ana I Bento ◽  
...  

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, two mainstream guidelines for defining when to end the isolation of SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals have been in use: the one-size-fits-all approach (i.e. patients are isolated for a fixed number of days) and the personalized approach (i.e. based on repeated testing of isolated patients). We use a mathematical framework to model within-host viral dynamics and test different criteria for ending isolation. By considering a fixed time of 10 days since symptom onset as the criterion for ending isolation, we estimated that the risk of releasing an individual who is still infectious is low (0–6.6%). However, this policy entails lengthy unnecessary isolations (4.8–8.3 days). In contrast, by using a personalized strategy, similar low risks can be reached with shorter prolonged isolations. The obtained findings provide a scientific rationale for policies on ending the isolation of SARS-CoV-2-infected individuals.


2015 ◽  
Vol 32 (2) ◽  
pp. 74-92 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lorna Elise Palmer ◽  
Kevin Durkin ◽  
Sinéad M. Rhodes

Explanations implicating memory in the causes and severity of checking symptoms have focused primarily on retrospective memory, and relatively little attention has been paid to prospective memory. Limited research has examined the relationship between prospective memory and executive functions. We assessed whether impairments in prospective memory and executive function predict checking symptoms in a sample of 106 adults. Checking symptoms were assessed using the Padua Inventory Washington State University Revision (PI-WSUR). All participants completed the prospective memory questionnaire (PMQ) and four computerised executive function tasks from the CANTAB, measuring inhibition, planning, attention set-shifting and working memory. Prospective memory and inhibition predicted checking symptom severity. Importantly, there were no correlations between internally cued prospective memory and inhibition or between prospective memory aiding strategies and inhibition. These variables appear to have an independent role in checking. The current findings highlight prospective memory and inhibition as key contributors to the checking symptom profile and provide the first evidence that these cognitive processes may independently contribute to checking symptoms. These findings have implications for a model in which memory performance is thought to be secondary to impairments in executive functions.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document