Clinical trial NCT04088136: Everyday Memory Intervention
Official title: Enhancing Older Adults' Everyday Memory Function
Study type: INTERVENTIONAL
Overall status: COMPLETED
Phase: NA
Conditions: Aging
Keywords: everyday memory
ecological momentary assessment
memory complaint
metacognition
mnemonics
external aids
Lead sponsor: Georgia Institute of Technology
Sponsor class: OTHER
Collaborators: name: National Institute on Aging (NIA)
First posted: 2019-09-12
Enrollment: 68
Sex: ALL
Minimum age (years): 70
Maximum age (years): 85
Standard ages: OLDER_ADULT
Accepts healthy volunteers: yes
Allocation: RANDOMIZED
Intervention model: PARALLEL
Primary purpose: BASIC_SCIENCE

Brief summary: Evaluates an intervention designed to improve everyday memory function, contrasting people receiving the intervention with a group that receives traditional memory strategy training.

Detailed description: This project seeks to develop and validate a novel approach to training everyday memory functioning in older adults. The approach (1) trains people to use simple but effective memory skills that have broad applicability in everyday life and (2) shapes a set of skills and habits of mind that will increase the likelihood of effective use of skills and memory aids. It is based on a metacognitive perspective on self-regulation in cognitively demanding situations and informed by recent theories about how suboptimal habit patterns can be altered. The approach has not yet been used in an everyday memory intervention in high-functioning, community-dwelling older adults. The proposed research validates ecological momentary assessment methods to get actual behavioral measures of forgetting in everyday life. It then uses these procedures in a randomized experiment that contrasts the everyday memory intervention group with a traditional memory-strategy training group. The hypothesis is that the everyday memory training intervention will reduce everyday memory errors and memory complaints, whereas the memory strategy training will alter strategy use and memory performance, with little cross-over effect. The hypothesized pattern will establish the explicit benefits of our everyday memory intervention procedures and demonstrate the limitation of standard memory training for that purpose.

Eligibility criteria: Inclusion Criteria:

* 70 - 85 years of age
* in fair to good health
* free of major neurocognitive impairment
* English speaking
* endorsed Smartphone and computer users (or willing to learn)

Exclusion Criteria:

* diagnosis of any major neurological problems (e.g. stroke, Parkinson's disease, dementia)
* 1.5 SD below age-normed mean (or lower) on the TICS
* low computer and smart phone literacy
* and poor self-rated health.

Primary outcomes:
measure: Everyday Memory Failures
timeFrame: minimum 8 day period after training on app prior to posttest
measure: Prospective Memory Lab Contacts
timeFrame: Two weeks prior to posttest
measure: Prospective Memory Lab Contact Efficiency
timeFrame: Two weeks prior to posttest
measure: Everyday Cognition Simulation Task: ATM Task (Number of Errors)
timeFrame: posttest only
measure: Czaja Everyday Cognition Simulation Task: Prescription Refill Task (Number of Errors)
timeFrame: posttest only
measure: Free Recall Test
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: Associative Recall Test
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: Story Recall
timeFrame: posttest only
measure: Everyday Cognition Simulation Task: ATM Task (Time in Seconds)
timeFrame: posttest only
measure: Czaja Everyday Cognition Simulation Task: Prescription Refill Task (Time in Seconds)
timeFrame: posttest only
Secondary outcomes:
measure: MFQ Memory Complaint (Frequency of Forgetting Scale)
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: PBMI Specific Memory Self-Efficacy
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: PBMI Memory Control
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: MCQ Internal Scale
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
measure: MCQ External
timeFrame: pretest and posttest (approximately 1 month lag)
Other outcomes:
Locations:
city: Atlanta
country: United States
facility: Adult Cognition Lab
state: Georgia
Study officials:
affiliation: Georgia Institute of Technology
name: Christopher Hertzog, Ph.D
role: PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR
References:
citation: Bailey H, Dunlosky J, Hertzog C. Metacognitive training at home: does it improve older adults' learning? Gerontology. 2010;56(4):414-20. doi: 10.1159/000266030. Epub 2009 Dec 11.
citation: Bailey HR, Dunlosky J, Hertzog C. Does strategy training reduce age-related deficits in working memory? Gerontology. 2014;60(4):346-56. doi: 10.1159/000356699. Epub 2014 Feb 27.
citation: Bottiroli S, Cavallini E, Dunlosky J, Vecchi T, Hertzog C. The importance of training strategy adaptation: a learner-oriented approach for improving older adults' memory and transfer. J Exp Psychol Appl. 2013 Sep;19(3):205-18. doi: 10.1037/a0034078. Epub 2013 Aug 26.
citation: Bottiroli S, Cavallini E, Dunlosky J, Vecchi T, Hertzog C. Self-guided strategy-adaption training for older adults: Transfer effects to everyday tasks. Arch Gerontol Geriatr. 2017 Sep;72:91-98. doi: 10.1016/j.archger.2017.05.015. Epub 2017 Jun 7.
citation: Dunlosky J, Cavallini E, Roth H, McGuire CL, Vecchi T, Hertzog C. Do self-monitoring interventions improve older adult learning? J Gerontol B Psychol Sci Soc Sci. 2007 Jun;62 Spec No 1:70-6. doi: 10.1093/geronb/62.special_issue_1.70.
citation: Dunlosky J, Hertzog C. Measuring strategy production during associative learning: the relative utility of concurrent versus retrospective reports. Mem Cognit. 2001 Mar;29(2):247-53. doi: 10.3758/bf03194918.
citation: Dunlosky, J., Hertzog, C., Kennedy, M. R. T., & Thiede, K. W. (2005). The self-monitoring approach for effective learning. Cognitive Technology, 10, 4-11.
citation: Dunlosky J, Kubat-Silman AK, Hertzog C. Training monitoring skills improves older adults' self-paced associative learning. Psychol Aging. 2003 Jun;18(2):340-5. doi: 10.1037/0882-7974.18.2.340.
citation: Hertzog C, McGuire CL, Horhota M, Jopp D. Does believing in "use it or lose it" relate to self-rated memory control, strategy use, and recall? Int J Aging Hum Dev. 2010;70(1):61-87. doi: 10.2190/AG.70.1.c.
citation: Hertzog C, Sinclair SM, Dunlosky J. Age differences in the monitoring of learning: cross-sectional evidence of spared resolution across the adult life span. Dev Psychol. 2010 Jul;46(4):939-48. doi: 10.1037/a0019812.
citation: Hertzog C, Dunlosky J. Metacognition in Later Adulthood: Spared Monitoring Can Benefit Older Adults' Self-regulation. Curr Dir Psychol Sci. 2011 Jun;20(3):167-173. doi: 10.1177/0963721411409026.
citation: Hertzog C, Lineweaver TT, Hines JC. Computerized assessment of age differences in memory beliefs. Percept Mot Skills. 2014 Oct;119(2):609-28. doi: 10.2466/03.10.PMS.119c23z4. Epub 2014 Sep 26.
citation: Hertzog C, Lustig E, Pearman A, Waris A. Behaviors and Strategies Supporting Everyday Memory in Older Adults. Gerontology. 2019;65(4):419-429. doi: 10.1159/000495910. Epub 2019 Feb 8.
citation: Lineweaver, T. T., & Hertzog, C. (1998). Adults' efficacy and control beliefs regarding memory and aging: Separating general from personal beliefs. Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition 5, 264-296. doi: 10.1076/anec.5.4.264.771