Neuropsychological Rehabilitation Assignment

LUMOSITY

Name: Rumana Zaib

Roll no.: 21MPSL60
Application: Lumosity

1. Ebb and Flow: Task Switching

In this game, you shift your focus between two details: where the leaves point and how they
move. This challenges your ability to switch between 2 cognitive processes: one interprets shape,
the other movement. Swiping in the direction which the green leaves are pointing at, and in the
direction of movement of orange leaves. When you switch tasks, your brain suppresses one of
these processes while activating the other - and this complex process often leads to mistakes.

Task Switching

Task switching is the process of adapting to changing circumstances, switching from one goal to
another. A key element of cognitive control, Task Switching is the capacity of humans to
transition between tasks in a flexible manner. The neural basis of task-switching have been
investigated in numerous functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies. The intrinsic
functional organization of the human brain varies from person to person, but no study has yet
looked at how this organization and task switching connect to one another.

Brain areas

Dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC), ventrolateral prefrontal cortex (VLPFC), frontopolar

cortex (FPC), pre-supplementary motor area (pre-SMA), and posterior parietal cortex (PPC) are
just a few of the frontoparietal brain regions that have been linked to task switching in functional
magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) studies. Further, a part of the brain called the left inferior
frontal junction (IFJ), which is anatomically situated at the junction of the inferior frontal and
inferior precentral sulcus, played a significant role in task switching and set shifting. However,
past neuroimaging research has mostly focused on describing what function these brain regions
serve in task-switching, and little is known about how these brain regions are structured to form
an intrinsic network for performing task switching.

Research:

Task-switching tests can be specifically used to investigate the executive function abnormalities
that typically emerge from concussion. Using both spatial and numerical cues, the current study
thoroughly investigated the impact of concussion on task switching performance. Testing was
performed on 16 individuals with concussion, 48 hours after the incident as well as 7, 14, and 28
days afterwards. At the same intervals, 16 healthy controls (matched for sex, age, height, weight,
and exercise) were also evaluated. Switch costs were significantly higher for both types of
stimuli in concussed subjects compared to controls. Concussion had no impact on the overall
expenses of the non-switching trials, in contrast. We come to the conclusion that concussion has
significant adverse effects on the capacity to switch task sets across task combinations (spatial or
numerical)

2. Memory serves : Working memory

Exercise your memory by delivering bags to hotel guests. As a bellhop, you’ll need to keep track
of your ever-changing inventory as you pick up and drop off the right set of bags to your hotel
guests. As you get better, your job will challenge your memory updating skills to keep track of
more luggage and more types of luggage.

Working Memory

Working memory is used for temporarily storing and manipulating information. Working
memory is a term that refers to a part of the brain which facilitates the temporary storage and
manipulation of the information required for difficult cognitive processes including language
comprehension, learning, and thinking. The idea of an unified short-term memory system served
as the foundation for this definition. It has been discovered that working memory requires the
simultaneous processing and storing of information. It is the “sketchpad of conscious thought.” It
is the platform where we hold and manipulate thoughts and is foundational to the organization of
goal-directed behavior (Chatham and Badre, 2015, Engle et al., 1999, Fuster, 1999,
Goldman-Rakic, 1995, Just and Carpenter, 1992, Miller and Cohen, 2001, Vogel and Machizawa,
2004). In contrast to long-term memory, which stores a large amount of knowledge over a
lifetime, working memory is the little amount of information that may be kept in mind and used
to carry out cognitive tasks. One of the most often used concepts in psychology is working
memory. In people ranging in age from infancy to old age and in all kinds of animals, it has
frequently been linked to or related to intelligence, information processing, executive function,
understanding, problem-solving, and learning. Working memory is made up of multiple
components (auditory, and visual). Working memory can both retain and process information, in
contrast to short-term memory's limited ability to do so. Short-term memory is working memory.
Yet, there are various systems for various sorts of information rather than all information
entering into one single storage.

Brain areas

Working memory is known to stimulate the prefrontal, cingulate, and parietal cortices as well as
other fronto-parietal brain areas from a neuroscientific perspective. Subcortical areas (such as the
midbrain and cerebellum) have subsequently been linked to working memory functions in recent
studies.

Research

In this long-term intervention study including experimental and control groups, they looked at
how video game training affected the episodic memory and visuospatial working memory (WM)
of healthy older individuals. Participants included a control group of 20 healthy older individuals
and a group of 19 volunteer older persons who underwent 15 1-hour video game training
sessions using a selection of games from a commercial package (Lumosity). The outcomes
demonstrated that all of the practiced video games greatly improved the trainees' performance.
Most importantly, it was found that the Corsi blocks task and the Jigsaw puzzle problem, two
computerized tasks created to test visuospatial working memory, showed significant
improvements after training in the trained group and no change in the control group. The trainees
also showed improvements in their short-term memory and episodic memory. A 3-month
follow-up period demonstrated the maintenance of improvements in a few WM and episodic
memory activities. According to these findings, the aging brain still exhibits some plasticity, and
video game training may be a useful intervention strategy for enhancing WM and other cognitive
abilities in older persons.

3. Speed Match : Information Processing

A fast-paced game, Speed Match exercises your brain’s ability to process information quickly
and accurately. A number of shapes, with respective colors will be displayed one ny one.
Choosing yes or no based on whether or not the previous card matches the current one. The game
gets progressively sped up.

Processing Speed

Processing speed is the ability to rapidly identify and analyze incoming sensory input. It is a
measure of the time required to respond to and/or process information in one's environment.
Research has demonstrated that processing speed substantially decreases as age increases. As a
result, when compared to younger adults, older people need more time to finish a cognitive task.

Brain areas

Previous studies of fractional anisotropy indicate that processing speed performance correlates
with properties of regional white matter in brain areas relevant to the task. During the
digit-symbol task (fronto-parieto-occipital areas play important roles in the execution of this
task), processing speed is correlated with visual choice reaction time in visual-related areas (in
the number of posterior regions of the right hemisphere), the left middle frontal gyrus, and the
occipital and parietal areas. Furthermore, the auditory reaction time task links the temporal lobe
to processing speed. On the other hand, some research indicates a connection between white
matter structure and global processing speed tasks.

Research

A common cognitive deficit in multiple sclerosis is information processing speed (IPS). This
review seeks to provide an overview of the approaches used to evaluate IPS in Multiple Sclerosis
and its theoretical framework. It appears that IPS generally deteriorates with illness progression,
though not for all people, with the SP course showing the most significant decrease, according to
a PubMed search of articles published between 1 January 2004 and 31 December 2013.

4. Lost in Migration : Selective attention

Lost in Migration exercises your attention abilities by asking you to identify where the lead bird
in a flock is headed, ignoring the distractor-birds around it.

Selective Attention

The ability to focus on relevant information while ignoring irrelevant distractions. Selective
attention refers to the processes that allow an individual to select and focus on particular input
for further processing while simultaneously suppressing irrelevant or distracting information.
Competing information might be internal, such as distracting thoughts or conditioned reflexes
that interfere with accomplishing the task at hand, or external, such as extraneous aural or visual
input in the surroundings.

Brain areas

Selective attention is mediated by a distributed large-scale network of brain regions, which

include frontal, parietal, temporal, and occipital cortices (Corbetta and Shulman, 2002; Kastner
and Ungerleider, 2000). In particular, frontal and parietal areas are thought to exert top-down
control over the neural activity in the visual cortex, through top-down biasing signals.

Research

In this study, attentional biases in the processing of emotional faces in participants who are or
have been depressed as well as healthy controls will be looked at. The authors used a dot-probe
task to offer joyful or sad faces alongside emotionally neutral faces. The control individuals
preferentially avoided the sad faces and orientated towards the joyful faces, a positive bias that
was not seen for either of the depressive groups, whereas both currently and formerly depressed
participants selectively attended to the sad faces. These findings suggest that even after people
have recovered from a depressive episode, attentional biases in the perception of emotional faces
are still present.

5. Train of thought : Attention

Your task is to guide an increasing number of trains to their stations. You must divide your
attention to guide them all simultaneously. Attention is a limited resource that can track only so
much information at once — so you must use your attention efficiently by planning ahead.

Divided Attention
Divided attention refers to the ability to simultaneously respond to multiple tasks or task
demands. It is the capacity of our brains to pay attention to two separate stimuli at once and
adjust our behavior to the various demands of our environment. We may successfully process
several information sources and do multiple tasks at once thanks to this type of simultaneous
attention. Because they help us be more effective in our daily lives, cognitive abilities are
incredibly significant.

Brain areas

Bilateral prefrontal activity is shown during divided attention. The left prefrontal cortex is
activated only in the divided attention task, indicating that this brain region represents the
location of executive functioning that involves a top‐down attentional control mechanism during
divided attention.

Research

The aim was to examine the effects of computer-based cognitive rehabilitation of attention in
work-active patients after stroke. 11 patients who were receiving inpatient care at the University
Rehabilitation Institute in Slovenia participated in the study. They underwent intensive selective
attention training four times per week for three months. Each patient had evaluations using the
TAP system (Test of Attentional Performance), alertness, and divided attention activities at both
the beginning and end of their rehabilitation. According to the findings, the divided attention test
showed a moderate to significant improvement in performance, while the alertness test showed
just a minor change. Following a stroke, early cognitive attentional system rehabilitation can
help patients who are working to regain split attention.
References:

Mayr, U., LaRoux, C., Rolheiser, T., Osternig, L., Chou, L.-S., & van Donkelaar, P. (2014).
Executive Dysfunction Assessed with a Task-Switching Task following Concussion. PLoS ONE,
9(3), e91379.

Yin, S., Wang, T., Pan, W., Liu, Y., & Chen, A. (2015). Task-switching Cost and Intrinsic
Functional Connectivity in the Human Brain: Toward Understanding Individual Differences in
Cognitive Flexibility. PLOS ONE, 10(12), e0145826.

Cowan, N. (2013). Working Memory Underpins Cognitive Development, Learning, and

Education. Educational Psychology Review, 26(2), 197–223. doi:10.1007/s10648-013-9246-y

Baddeley, A. (1992). Working memory. Science, 255(5044), 556–559.

Chai, W. J., Abd Hamid, A. I., & Abdullah, J. M. (2018). Working Memory From the
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Toril, P., Reales, J. M., Mayas, J., & Ballesteros, S. (2016). Video Game Training Enhances
Visuospatial Working Memory and Episodic Memory in Older Adults. Frontiers in Human
Neuroscience, 10.

Magistro, D., Takeuchi, H., Nejad, K. K., Taki, Y., Sekiguchi, A., Nouchi, R., … Kawashima, R.
(2015). The Relationship between Processing Speed and Regional White Matter Volume in
Healthy Young People. PLOS ONE, 10(9), e0136386. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0136386

Costa, S. L., Genova, H. M., DeLuca, J., & Chiaravalloti, N. D. (2016). Information processing
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Starovasnik Žagavec, B., Mlinarič Lešnik, V., & Goljar, N. (2015). Training of selective attention
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