Transfer and Motivation After Cognitive Control Training for Remitted Depression in Healthy Sample

Abstract

Objective: Given that cognitive control deficits following remission from depression form a risk factor for recurrence, new interventions aimed at improving cognitive control such as cognitive control training, are being developed. Previous studies suggest that motivation and engagement can influence effectiveness of cognitive training. As such, we developed a gamified cognitive control training procedure. Before validating this tool in a clinical sample, a convenience sample was used to ensure that gamification did not add any unwanted side effects to the cognitive training procedure. Materials and methods: This study was preregistered on the Open Science Framework (osf.io/5yacs). Following a baseline assessment, participants were assigned to one of four training conditions, manipulating training task (cognitive control vs. active control) and gamification level (low vs. high). Having performed ten sessions, participants were invited for a post-training assessment. Impact of gamification on cognitive transfer, motivation, and emotional transfer was investigated.Results: Our results suggest task-specific near cognitive transfer. In line with our hypotheses, gamification level did not affect cognitive transfer while beneficially impacting motivation.Moreover, beneficial effects of gamified cognitive control training were found for selfreported anxiety levels, in absence of effects on the other clinical outcomes.Conclusion: This study showed that the newly developed gamified cognitive control training procedure yields similar effects as non-gamified cognitive control training. However, the advantage of this newly developed version is that it is more user-friendly, easy-to-use, online, and that its settings maximize user motivation and engagement, potentially enabling a more effective training.

Preventing Recurrence of Depression: Long-Term Effects of a Randomized Controlled Trial on Cognitive Control Training for Remitted Depressed Patients

“…In particular, a discrepancy between the CCT and ACT condition seemed to develop around the period of 3 months after the intervention. This is in line with recent findings suggesting a delayed effect of CCT on depressive symptoms in RMD patients (e.g., Vervaeke et al, 2020). On the basis of the obtained cutoff for the weekly ratings, estimated recurrence rates were 31.82% in the CCT condition compared with 51.22% in the ACT condition.…”

“…This may be due to overlap between the domains of influence of both training procedures (i.e., potentially affecting broader attentional processes). This result is in line with a recent replication study providing mixed evidence for the emotional transfer effects of aPASAT training compared with a similar active control training in RMD patients (Vervaeke et al, 2020). That is, in contrast to Hoorelbeke and Koster (2017), Vervaeke and colleagues (2020) did not observe beneficial effects of aPASAT training on self-reported emotion regulation or resilience over a 6-month follow-up period.…”

“…This result is in line with a recent replication study providing mixed evidence for the emotional transfer effects of aPASAT training compared with a similar active control training in RMD patients (Vervaeke et al, 2020). That is, in contrast to Hoorelbeke and Koster (2017), Vervaeke and colleagues (2020) did not observe beneficial effects of aPASAT training on self-reported emotion regulation or resilience over a 6-month follow-up period. Instead, Vervaeke et al observed a general reduction in rumination over time.…”

“…Related to this, assessments of effects of aPASAT training on emotional functioning have typically also been limited in time (e.g., Hoorelbeke & Koster, 2017; Vervaeke et al, 2020), providing only indirect evidence for the potential of CCT as a preventive intervention for depression (for a review, see Koster et al, 2017). The value of CCT in terms of preventing recurrence of depression remains to be tested.…”

Aging Associated Specificity in Training Visual Short-Term Memory

“…It has been shown that the effectiveness of cognitive training can be increased due to involvement in activities and increased motivation through learning cognitive control using play procedures or nonplay learning [51]. Improving visual memory is possible through the application of a strategy for controlling attention and directing it to target memory components [40].…”