Working Memory Training in Old Age: An Examination of Transfer and Maintenance Effects

Borella, Erika; Carretti, Barbara; Zanoni, Giulia; Zavagnin, Michela; Béni, Rossana De

doi:10.1093/arclin/act020

Cited by 84 publications

(97 citation statements)

References 49 publications

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“…This impression is supported by the finding that the significant transfer gains seen were not maintained. The general lack of transfer effects in the old-old is in line with the findings of Borella et al (2013), who also reported no gains in terms of transfer effects after verbal WM training in the old-old, suggesting that they can benefit from this kind of training, but not as much as the young-old in Borella et al (2010). At the same time, it is also possible that similarly to young-old, also for old-old the training may have elicited only specific-WM-and not generalized processes.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

“…Indeed, the few studies examining transfer effects in old-old participants found transfer effects mainly for tasks similar to those used in the training, and less so for different tasks (e.g., Borella et al, 2013;Buschkuehl et al, 2008;Zinke et al, 2012). Borella et al (2013) focused on the potential role of age in determining the success of training, applying the Borella et al (2010) training procedure to the old-old.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Benefits of training visuospatial working memory in young–old and old–old.

Borella

Carretti

Cantarella

et al. 2014

Developmental Psychology

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The purpose of the present study was to test the efficacy of a visuospatial working memory (WM) training in terms of its transfer effects and maintenance effects, in the young-old and old-old. Forty young-old and 40 old-old adults took part in the study. Twenty participants in each age group received training with a visuospatial WM task, whereas the others served as active controls and completed alternative activities. Training benefits were examined, considering (a) the specific training-related gains in a visuospatial WM task (criterion); and (b) the transfer effects on measures of verbal WM, visuospatial short-term memory, inhibition, processing speed, and reasoning. Maintenance of training benefits was also assessed after 8 months. Results showed that the trained groups (both young-old and old-old), but not the control groups, performed better in the WM measures and preserved these gains after 8 months. Some transfer effects were found, but only in the young-old-trained participants, and they were not maintained at the follow-up. These results are discussed in terms of the efficacy of WM training for older adults when a visuospatial modality is used.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 87%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Benefits of training visuospatial working memory in young–old and old–old.

Borella

Carretti

Cantarella

et al. 2014

Developmental Psychology

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“…Although we tested only healthy older adults, the finding indicated that the older participants in the CWMS group improved more than younger participants among our sample. It supports also other work of Borella and collaborators that showed significant training and transfer effects not only in a sample of young-old adults (age range 65 to 75 years; Borella et al 2010) but also in old-old adults (age range 75 to 87 years; Borella et al 2013). However, these findings contrast an earlier study that reported smaller training and transfer gains with increasing age in older adults and no influence of crystallized abilities (Zinke et al 2014); however, Zinke et al (2014) trained much older adults than our study.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 90%

“…The large training benefit in the working memory training group follows up on earlier findings of studies using the same training regime (Borella et al 2010;Borella et al 2013;Cantarella et al 2017;Carretti et al 2013). Although the training was relatively short with only four training sessions, trained participants still achieved a substantial increase in performance that was not attributable to pure retest effects as seen in the control group, but to actual gains based on the working memory training.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 64%

Improving Older Adults’ Working Memory: the Influence of Age and Crystallized Intelligence on Training Outcomes

et al. 2017

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To counter age-related decline in cognitive abilities, interventions such as working memory trainings have shown some promising results in old age. Yet, findings are mixed and there is enormous interindividual variability in training and transfer effects. Thus, it is still an open question which person-specific factors may moderate training and transfer effects in working memory interventions in older adults. The present study investigated this issue in the context of an established verbal working memory training. Eighty-eight participants (age range 60-82 years) performed either four sessions of the Borella et al. (Psychology and Aging 25(4):767-778, 2010) working memory training or of a visual search training as active control condition or belonged to a passive control group. Before and after the training, participants performed a test battery to assess different cognitive abilities and everyday competence. Furthermore, we included questionnaires on personality factors and intrinsic motivation as possible covariates. The training group showed a substantial training gain in the working memory criterion task that was not found in the active control group. Furthermore, only participants of the working memory training showed also near transfer to another working memory task. No far transfer effects including everyday competence emerged. In terms of possible moderators, age and crystallized intelligence influenced the training and transfer gain in the training group. In conclusion, our results showed that working memory can be improved in older adults and improvements transfer to a nontrained working memory task. However, person-specific factors have to be considered to understand who benefits from the training and why.

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“…Recently, some studies have investigated whether a cognitive training targeting WM improves WM and found positive and even long-lasting effects of 8 months (Borella et al, 2010;. In addition, their WM training had effect on other cognitive abilities like processing speed (Borella et al, 2010) and inhibitory control (Borella et al, 2013). Interestingly, a limited number of studies have shown transfer of cognitive training effects to driving ability, as an improvement of cognitive ability lead to an improvement of driving ability (Ball et al, 2010;Ball et al, 2013;Cassavaugh and Kramer, 2009;Edwards et al, 2009a,b;Roenker et al, 2003).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Training Working Memory of Older Drivers: The Effect on Working Memory and Simulated Driving Performance

Cuenen

Jongen

Brijs

et al. 2015

Proceedings of the 8th International Driving Symposium on Human Factors in Driver Assessment, Training, and Vehicle Design: Dri

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Summary:This study aimed to investigate in older drivers whether a working memory (WM) training would enhance WM, and whether improvement of WM transfers to enhanced driving ability. 54 older drivers participated in the study, but due to drop-out, 38 participants (mean age 70.34) remained in the sample. Participants were randomly assigned to a control (N=19) or an experimental condition (N=19). Each participant conducted a WM training during 25 days. During the pre-test and post-test, WM and driving ability were assessed. Results indicate that the training lead to an improvement of WM. In addition, there was an improvement of several driving measures, that was however independent of the level of WM improvement. These findings will be discussed.

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Working Memory Training in Old Age: An Examination of Transfer and Maintenance Effects

Cited by 84 publications

References 49 publications

Benefits of training visuospatial working memory in young–old and old–old.

Benefits of training visuospatial working memory in young–old and old–old.

Improving Older Adults’ Working Memory: the Influence of Age and Crystallized Intelligence on Training Outcomes

Training Working Memory of Older Drivers: The Effect on Working Memory and Simulated Driving Performance

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