Brain Changes With Game Training in Aging
Condition: Aging; Dementia
MeSH terms: Dementia
Study type: Interventional

Summary: 
      The purpose is to use MRI to investigate brain changes associated with playing a race car
      video game for 90 minutes in aging adults both with and without early signs of dementia.
    

Detailed description: 
      Neuroplasticity is an important process associated with memory and learning, and may be
      impaired in early Alzheimer's disease (AD). Video games are one potential strategy for
      investigating adaptive cognitive learning. Recent neuroimaging studies in healthy young
      adults have been able to detect brain changes associated with learning and memory from a
      racing video game over relatively short training periods of a couple hours. This strategy
      offers significant promise for characterizing the potential for neuroplasticity in patients
      at risk for AD including amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI).

      This project will apply video game training with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) brain
      scanning to investigate adaptive learning, working memory and neuroplasticity as a function
      of aging and in patients with aMCI. A total of forty participants will be studied. Twenty
      subjects will undergo the video game training. Twenty subjects will be passive controls.

      Specific Aims:

      To characterize the microstructural brain changes after video game training in aging subjects
      and determine how patients with amnestic MCI (aMCI) and early AD are affected. For this
      study, adult participants ages 50 and older including patients with aMCI and early AD will
      undergo two neuroimaging sessions spaced roughly two hours apart that are bracketed around
      roughly 90 minutes of car racing game play. We will use diffusion-weighted imaging to detect
      longitudinal changes in microstructure of the hippocampus and parahippocampus. A primary
      objective of this study is to demonstrate that these training and imaging methods are
      translatable to patients with MCI. We will investigate the following two important
      hypotheses.

      Hypothesis 1: Following car racing video game play, participants, on average, will
      demonstrate significant microstructural changes in hippocampal and parahippocampal brain
      regions measured with MRI.

      Hypothesis 2: The microstructural changes in the hippocampus and parahippocampus measured
      with MRI will be significantly correlated with (a) cognitive memory performance as assessed
      by recent memory assessments, and (b) improvements in video game performance in all
      participants.

      The primary outcome measures for both Hypotheses are the changes in the MRI measurements
      following car racing video game play.

      A long-term objective of this project is to determine whether imaging short term
      neuroplasticity is predictive for individual patients of either future conversion to AD or
      the effectiveness of cognitive training therapies. More generally, neuroimaging markers of
      learning-induced brain plasticity would provide extremely useful tools for investigations of
      aging, dementias, and neurodegenerative diseases.
    

Intervention name(s): Race Car Video Game
Intervention type(s): Behavioral
Intervention description(s): Repeatedly playing a race car video game
Allocation: Non-Randomized
Intervention model: Single Group Assignment
Masking: None (Open Label)
Primary purpose: Basic Science