Normal aging is associated with gradual cognitive declines. These mild neurocognitive disturbances affect daily functioning, health status, and quality of life, and likely account for the roughly $2.9 billion lost by the elderly each year to fraud. The goal of this project is to compare two different 8-week training programs to promote successful neural and cognitive aging. Changes in neural structure and cognitive function will be assessed in a cohort of older adults, as well as the long-term stability of these changes over 24 months.
Normal aging is associated with gradual cognitive declines. These mild neurocognitive disturbances affect daily functioning, health status, and quality of life, and likely account for the roughly $2.9 billion lost by the elderly each year to fraud. People are paying millions out of pocket for cognitive training programs like Lumosity to stave off these declines. These cognitive decreases have been strongly associated with normal age-dependent declines in neural structure and function, including cortical thickness decreases (approximately 0.02 mm per decade) across most of the cortical mantle, as well as decreases in the volume of the hippocampus (approximately 1-2% annually), white matter microstructure, and functional connectivity across the brain. Life expectancy is increasing and so identifying interventions that can be widely implemented and that can slow or reverse normal cognitive decline are clinical and public health priorities. Some training programs can improve cognitive performance in cognitively normal older adults, and gains are maintained post training. The investigators hypothesize that different techniques to boost cognition likely works through different neural mechanisms, and thus may provide different cognitive benefits. The goal of this project is to compare two different 8-week training programs to promote successful neural and cognitive aging. Changes in neural structure and cognitive function will be assessed in a cohort of older adults, as well as the long-term stability of these changes over 24 months.
Study Type
INTERVENTIONAL
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Purpose
BASIC_SCIENCE
Masking
TRIPLE
Enrollment
175
8 week cognitive training program
Massachusetts General Hospital
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Change in brain structure
Gray matter structure will be assessed before and after the 8 week programs.
Time frame: 8 weeks
Change in brain activity during a memory test
Brain activity during a memory task will be assessed before and after the 8 week programs.
Time frame: 8 weeks
Blood markers
Blood will be collected at baseline, 8 weeks, 12 and 24 months. This will be used to assess changes in various biomarkers that are known to change with aging.
Time frame: baseline, 8 weeks, 12 and 24 months
Change in cognition
Participants will complete a series of memory and attention tests at 6 time-points: baseline, 2 months, 6 months, 12 months 18 months and 24 months.
Time frame: 2 years
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