Psychology Commons^™

Nutrition As A Modifiable Risk Factor For Cognitive Decline: Associated Cognitive And Physical Health Changes, Taylor Mcmillan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Dementia is defined as gradual, progressive loss of cognitive functioning, greater than what is expected of normal aging, resulting in functional impairment. There are several types of dementia clinical syndromes that are accompanied by unique patterns of cognitive dysfunction and neuropathological changes. Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common type of clinical dementia syndrome, accounting for approximately 60-70% of cases. Neuropathological mechanisms associated with AD include the disruption of the cholinergic system, accumulation of amyloid-beta plaques and hyperphosphorylated tau, as well as vascular pathology. Vascular pathology complicates the characterization of clinical and neuropathic changes in AD, as there becomes significant …

Oral Contraception And Cognition, Kathleen Gerencer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Oral contraception is currently used by over 100 million women worldwide. Women utilize contraception not only to prevent pregnancy but also to manage a wide range of health concerns, such as acne and polycystic ovarian syndrome. Although this medication has granted women bodily autonomy, helped them attain higher levels of education, and helped them enter the workforce in greater numbers, little is known about the consequences outside of the intended contraceptive effects, specifically the cognitive and behavioral consequences. Moreover, because doctors can prescribe contraception after the first menstrual cycle and during puberty, it’s possible that this critical window of development …

Uncertainty Monitoring In Category Learning And Transfer, Rose Deng

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Uncertainty is commonly experienced by many people during learning and decision making. Given that many career paths require the ability to monitor uncertainty, it’s important to understand how metacognitive processes influence cognitive performance. In attempts to explore how uncertainty monitoring impacts learning, three experiments were conducted. The first and second experiment utilized a categorization task in which participants explicitly learned to categorize Chemistry concepts. The third experiment assessed the impact of uncertainty monitoring on implicit learning and utilized a different task to tap into the implicit learning system. The present dissertation is one of few to investigate the role of …

Emotion Regulation Deficits And Depression-Related Maladaptive Interpersonal Behaviours, Eliot Fearey, Jesse Evans, Rebecca A. Schwartz-Mette

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Coyne’s interpersonal theory of depression posits that those with depressive symptoms engage in maladaptive interpersonal behaviours that, although intended to assuage distress, push away social supports and increase depressive symptoms (Coyne, 1976). Excessive reassurance seeking, negative feedback seeking, and conversational self-focus are three behaviours implicated in Coyne’s theory, yet their correlates- apart from depressive symptoms- are poorly understood. The current study considered the potential role of intrapersonal emotion regulation deficits as an additional vulnerability factor for these behaviours. Mediation models further tested whether linkages between emotion regulation deficits and maladaptive interpersonal behaviours helped to explain short-term increases in depressive symptoms, …

The Effect That Testing Has On Nondeclarative Memory, David Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Testing has been shown to improve long-term memory retention by decreasing the amount of material forgotten, a phenomenon known as the testing effect. This positive impact of testing has been shown using direct tests of memory that require declarative memory, things like memorizing word-pairs and single-word lists. This dissertation is the first research to investigate how testing impacts nondeclarative memory using three experiments. The first and second experiment utilize the word fragment completion task to measure the effect that testing has on words learned via methodology thought to recruit either declarative or nondeclarative memory. The third experiment utilizes a probabilistic …

New Methodologies For Examining And Supporting Student Reasoning In Physics, John C. Speirs

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Learning how to reason productively is an essential goal of an undergraduate education in any STEM-related discipline. Many non-physics STEM majors are required to take introductory physics as part of their undergraduate programs. While certain physics concepts and principles may be of use to these students in their future academic careers and beyond, many will not. Rather, it is often expected that the most valuable and longlasting learning outcomes from a physics course will be a repertoire of problem-solving strategies, a familiarity with mathematizing real-world situations, and the development of a strong set of qualitative inferential reasoning skills.

For more …

Wireless Sensor System For Mild Cognitive Impairment Diagnosis, Ahmed A. Almaghasilah Mr

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Alzheimer’s disease (AD), which causes decline in the cognitive functions, is the

major lead of dementia. AD begins showing damage in memory, making patients

dependent on caregivers. Treating AD requires early diagnosis of its signs. The

initial sign of AD is mild cognitive impairment (MCI), which is the middle stage

between a healthy patient and one diagnosed with AD. The proposed sleep

monitoring system is capable of diagnosing MCI symptoms.

MCI patients are characterized with sleep fragmentation and sleep disorder. The

sleep fragmentation is defined as awakenings that interrupt the normal sleep. The

proposed system in this thesis uses force …

Prospective Associations Of Homocysteine, Executive Function, And Depressive Symptoms, Peter J. Dearborn

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Associations of cardiovascular risk factors, cognitive performance, and depressive symptoms have been well established. However, the directionality of these associations as well as the specificity of these associations with respect to executive function are less clear. Additionally few studies have determined whether genetic risk factors, such as apolipoprotein-E4 (APOE-E4) genotype, and age moderate the associations of cardiovascular risk factors such as homocysteine with changes in depressive symptoms and how these associations may be mediated by cognitive performance. The primary aim of this study was to analyze the bidirectional associations of a full range of cognitive domains and symptoms of depression …

Prospective Studies Of Cardiovascular Risk Factors And Mild Cognitive Impairment, Kevin Sullivan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The association of cardiovascular risk factors including hypertension, diabetes, cholesterol, kidney function, and arterial stiffness with cognitive impairment in older adults is a well-studied phenomenon. However, there is considerably less evidence relating cardiovascular health specifically to a diagnosis of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI). As a precursor state of dementia, MCI is characterized by a decline in cognitive function from previous level, but not to the degree that activities of daily living are impaired. Not everyone who is diagnosed with MCI will eventually transition to dementia, but the transition rates are much higher compared to the general population (5-15% per year …

Albuminuria And Cognitive Performance: New Evidence For Consideration Of A Risk Factor Precursor Model From The Maastricht Study, Merrill F. Elias, Rachael V. Torres, Adam Davey

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

No abstract provided.

Evaluation Of Multi-Level Cognitive Maps For Supporting Between-Floor Spatial Behavior In Complex Indoor Environments, Hengshan Li

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

People often become disoriented when navigating in complex, multi-level buildings. To efficiently find destinations located on different floors, navigators must refer to a globally coherent mental representation of the multi-level environment, which is termed a multi-level cognitive map. However, there is a surprising dearth of research into underlying theories of why integrating multi-level spatial knowledge into a multi-level cognitive map is so challenging and error-prone for humans. This overarching problem is the core motivation of this dissertation.

We address this vexing problem in a two-pronged approach combining study of both basic and applied research questions. Of theoretical interest, we investigate …

Chocolate Intake Is Associated With Better Cognitive Function: The Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study, Georgina E. Crichton, Merrill F. Elias, Ala’A Alkerwi

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

Chocolate and cocoa flavanols have been associated with improvements in a range of health complaints dating from ancient times, and has established cardiovascular benefits. Less is known about the effects of chocolate on neurocognition and behaviour. The aim of this study was to investigate whether chocolate intake was associated with cognitive function, with adjustment for cardiovascular, lifestyle and dietary factors. Cross-sectional analyses were undertaken on 968 community-dwelling participants, aged 23e98 years, from the Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study (MSLS). Habitual chocolate intake was related to cognitive performance, measured with an extensive battery of neuropsychological tests. More frequent chocolate consumption was significantly associated …

Risk For Cognitive Impairment Across 22 Measures Of Cognitive Ability In Early-Stage Chronic Kidney Disease, Rachael V. Torres, Merrill F. Elias, Stephen L. Seliger, Adam Davey, Michael A. Robbins

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

No abstract provided.

Sugar-Sweetened Soft Drinks Are Associated With Poorer Cognitive Function In Individuals With Type 2 Diabetes: The Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study, Georgina E. Crichton, Merrill F. Elias, Rachael V. Torres

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

The importance of adequate nutrition on cognitive performance is well recognised. Greater intakes of soft drinks are associated with a higher risk for type 2 diabetes, as well as other cardiometabolic diseases. A few studies have specifically examined whether the intake of soft drinks may be related to cognitive function. The aim of this study was to investigate whether soft drink intakes, including both sugar-sweetened and diet beverages, are associated with cognitive function, with adjustment for cardiovascular, lifestyle and dietary factors, and stratified according to type 2 diabetes status. Cross-sectional analyses were undertaken using 803 community-dwelling participants, aged 23–98 years, …

The Temporal Nature Of The Acute Stress Response And Its Impact On Explicit Learning, Steven B. Hutchinson

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Acute stress is commonly experienced by many throughout their lives. Given the demanding lifestyle of many career paths, it's important to gauge the influence of these stressors upon cognitive performance. The present dissertation focus' upon explicit learning in attempts to explore one avenue of the stress-cognition relationship. The Trier Social Stress Test (TSST) was used as a lab stressor for Experiments 1 and 2, in which participants are asked to give a speech and complete a difficult math task in front of 2 evaluators trained to monitor non-verbal behavior. Experiment 1 investigates the dynamic stress response during the minutes following …

One Giant Leap For Categorizers: One Small Step For Categorization Theory, David J. Smith, Shawn W. Ell

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

We explore humans’ rule-based category learning using analytic approaches that highlight their psychological transitions during learning. These approaches confirm that humans show qualitatively sudden psychological transitions during rule learning. These transitions contribute to the theoretical literature contrasting single vs. multiple category-learning systems, because they seem to reveal a distinctive learning process of explicit rule discovery. A complete psychology of categorization must describe this learning process, too. Yet extensive formal-modeling analyses confirm that a wide range of current (gradient-descent) models cannot reproduce these transitions, including influential rule-based models (e.g., COVIS) and exemplar models (e.g., ALCOVE). It is an important theoretical conclusion …

Long Term Effects Of Chemotherapy On Cognition, Preventative Potential Of Antidepressants, Ryan Hall

Honors College

Each year, over 1.6 million people in the U.S. alone will be diagnosed with some form of cancer. With advances in treatment, survival rates have risen to nearly 65%. While remission and survival are the ultimate goals of treatment, it has become clear that many cancer survivors (estimates range from 15% to 70%) treated with chemotherapy experience significant, long-lasting cognitive impairment. This chemotherapy associated cognitive impairment is often called "Chemo Fog" or "Chemo Brain." For some, the effects are mild, such as having difficulty with focusing, concentrating, and speed of processing. For others, the cognitive impairments can be significant and …

Is Pressure Stressful? The Impact Of Pressure On The Stress Response And Category Learning, Shannon L. Mccoy, Steven B. Hutchinson, Lauren Hawthorne, Brandon J. Cosley, Shawn W. Ell

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

We examine the basic question of whether pressure is stressful. We propose that when examining the role of stress or pressure in cognitive performance it is important to consider the type of pressure, the stress response, and the aspect of cognition assessed. In Experiment 1, outcome pressure was not experienced as stressful but did lead to impaired performance on a rule-based (RB) category learning task and not a more procedural information-integration (II) task. In Experiment 2, the addition of monitoring pressure resulted in a modest stress response to combined pressure and impairment on both tasks. Across experiments, higher stress appraisals …

Targeted Training Of The Decision Rule Benefits Rule-Guided Behavior In Parkinson’S Disease, Shawn W. Ell

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

The impact of Parkinson’s disease (PD) on rule-guided behavior has received considerable attention in cognitive neuroscience. The majority of research has used PD as a model of dysfunction in fronto-striatal networks, but very few attempts have been made to investigate the possibility of adapting common experimental techniques in an effort to identify the conditions that are most likely to facilitate successful performance. The present study investigated a targeted training paradigm designed to facilitate rule learning and application using rule-based categorization as a model task. Participants received targeted training in which there was no selective-attention demand (i.e., stimuli varied along a …

Hypertension And Cognitive Functioning: A Perspective In Historical Context, Merrill F. Elias, Amanda L. Goodell, Gregory A. Dore

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

Our objective is to characterize the development of the literature on hypertension and cognitive functioning from a historical perspective. This goal was stimulated by the review on “Historical Trends and Milestones in Hypertension Research” in the October 2012 issue of Hypertension. Our specific aims are threefold: (1) to trace and describe the history of this area of research; (2) to identify milestones in knowledge and methods; and (3) to discuss briefly how this literature translates into patient care. The topic is of major relevance to research and practice because hypertension is a well-known risk factor for decline in cognitive performance …

Unsupervised Category Learning With Integral-Dimension Stimuli, Shawn W. Ell, Gregory F. Ashby, Steven B. Hutchinson

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Despite the recent surge in research on unsupervised category learning, the majority of studies have focused on unconstrained tasks in which no instructions are provided about the underlying category structure. Relatively little research has focused on constrained tasks in which the goal is to learn pre-defined stimulus clusters in the absence of feedback. The few studies that have addressed this issue have focused almost exclusively on stimuli for which it is relatively easy to attend selectively to the component dimensions (i.e., separable dimensions). In the present study, we investigated the ability of participants to learn categories constructed from stimuli for …

The Impact Of Category Separation On Unsupervised Categorization, Shawn W. Ell, Gregoryh F. Ashby

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Most previous research on unsupervised categorization has used unconstrained tasks in which no instructions are provided about the underlying category structure or the stimuli are not clustered into categories. Few studies have investigated constrained tasks in which the goal is to learn pre-defined stimulus clusters in the absence of feedback. These studies have generally reported good performance when the stimulus clusters could be separated by a one-dimensional rule. The present study investigated the limits of this ability. Results suggest that even when two stimulus clusters are as widely separated as in previous studies, performance is poor if within-category variance on …

When Bad Stress Goes Good: Increased Threat Reactivity Predicts Improved Category Learning Performance, Shawn W. Ell, Brandon Cosley, Shannon L. Mccoy

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

The way in which we respond to everyday stressors can have a profound impact on cognitive functioning. Maladaptive stress responses in particular are generally associated with impaired cognitive performance. We argue, however, that the cognitive system mediating task performance is also a critical determinant of the stress-cognition relationship. Consistent with this prediction, we observed that stress reactivity consistent with a maladaptive, threat response differentially predicted performance on two categorization tasks. Increased threat reactivity predicted enhanced performance on an information-integration task (i.e., learning is thought to depend upon a procedural-based memory system), and a (nonsignificant) trend for impaired performance on a …

Rule-Based Categorization Deficits In Focal Basal Ganglia Lesion And Parkinson’S Disease Patients, Shawn W. Ell, Andrea Weinstein, Richard Ivry

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Patients with basal ganglia (BG) pathology are consistently found to be impaired on rule-based category learning tasks in which learning is thought to depend upon the use of an explicit, hypothesis-guided strategy. The factors that influence this impairment remain unclear. Moreover, it remains unknown if the impairments observed in patients with degenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease (PD) are also observed in those with focal BG lesions. In the present study, we tested patients with either focal BG lesions or PD on two categorization tasks that varied in terms of their demands on selective attention and working memory. Individuals with …

From Blood Pressure To Physical Disability: The Role Of Cognition, Merrill F. Elias, Gregory A. Dore, Adam Davey, Michael A. Robbins, Penelope K. Elias

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

We examined the hypothesis that lowered cognitive performance plays a role in the relation between elevated blood pressure and physical disability in performing basic physical tasks. A community-based sample (N = 1025) free from stroke and dementia (mean age: 61.1 years; SD: 13.0 years; 59.8% women) was used. Using path analysis, systolic and diastolic blood pressures (predictor variable) measured over multiple longitudinal examinations were averaged and related to multiple measures of cognition (intermediate variable) and physical ability (PA; outcome variable) measured at wave 6 of the Maine-Syracuse Study. PA was indexed by time required to execute standing, walking, and turning …

Criterial Noise Effects On Rule-Based Category Learning: The Impact Of Delayed Feedback, Shawn W. Ell, David A. Ing, Todd W. Maddox

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Variability in the representation of the decision criterion is assumed in many category learning models yet few studies have directly examined its impact. On each trial, criterial noise should result in drift in the criterion and will negatively impact categorization accuracy, particularly in rule-based categorization tasks where learning depends upon the maintenance and manipulation of decision criteria. The results of three experiments test this hypothesis and examine the impact of working memory on slowing the drift rate. Experiment 1 examined the effect of drift by inserting a 5 s delay between the categorization response and the delivery of corrective feedback, …

Arterial Pulse Wave Velocity And Cognition With Advancing Age, Merrill F. Elias, Michael A. Robbins, Marc M. Budge, Walter P. Abhayaratna, Gregory A. Dore, Penelope K. Elias

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

We hypothesized that carotid-femoral pulse wave velocity (PWV), a marker of arterial stiffness, interacts with age such that the magnitude of associations between PWV and cognitive performance are greater with increasing age and that this interaction is observed despite adjustments for demographic variables, mean arterial pressure, and cardiovascular risk factors. PWV was estimated using applanation tonometry in 409 dementia- and stroke-free participants of the Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Study (24 to 92 years of age; 62.3% women). Using linear regression analyses in a cross-sectional design, associations between PWV and age and the interaction of PWV and age were examined in relation to …

Chronic Kidney Disease, Creatinine And Cognitive Functioning, Merrill F. Elias, Penelope K. Elias, Stephen L. Seliger, Sriram S. Narsipur, Gregory A. Dore, Michael A. Robbins

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

Background. Non-dialysis-dependent chronic kidney dis- ease (CKD) is related to cognitive impairment. Previous studies have not explored the extent of impairment across multiple cognitive domains. We examined the range of specific cognitive abilities affected by CKD and whether the associations of CKD with cognition were eliminated by statistical control for cardiovascular disease correlates of CKD. Methods. We performed a community-based cross-sectional study with 923 individuals free from dementia and end-stage renal disease. Two groups were defined based on estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR): eGFR/min/1.73 m2 versus eGFR≥60 mL/min/1.73 m2. Out- come measures were scores from multiple clinical tests of specific …

Dismantling An Act-Based Intervention For Work Stress: Do Values Really Matter?, Barbara A. Hermann

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), a multi-component intervention within the third-wave of behavioral therapy, has been shown to improve various outcomes in diverse populations and administration formats. This study utilized a dismantling design to investigate whether the values components of an ACT-based intervention for work stress add to the effects of the intervention beyond those of the mindfulness components and to explore possible mediators of change. Expanding beyond existing studies of ACT, a broad range of outcomes were examined pretreatment, post-treatment, and at three follow-up assessments in a small sample (N = 16) of employees of a university in the …

Relation Between Central Adiposity And Cognitive Function In The Maine–Syracuse Study: Attenuation By Physical Activity, Gregory A. Dore, Merrill F. Elias, Michael A. Robbins, Marc M. Budge, Penelope K. Elias

Maine-Syracuse Longitudinal Papers

Background. Previous studies have demonstrated a relationship between central adiposity and cognitive function. However, only some of these studies have adjusted for cardiovascular risk factors and cardiovascular disease, and none have also adjusted for physical activity level. Purpose. The purpose of the study was to examine the association between anthropometric measures of central adiposity (waist circumference and waist/hip ratio) and cognitive functioning with adjustment for cardiovascular disease risk factors and physical activity. Methods. Participants were 917 stroke- and dementia-free community-dwelling adults (59% women) in the Maine– Syracuse Study. The design was cross-sectional. Outcome measures included tests from …