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Journal ArticleDOI

Construct validity of the Trail Making Test: Role of task-switching, working memory, inhibition/interference control, and visuomotor abilities

TLDR
The results suggest that T MT-A requires mainly visuoperceptual abilities, TMT-B reflects primarily working memory and secondarily task-switching ability, while B-A minimizes visu operceptual and working memory demands, providing a relatively pure indicator of executive control abilities.
Abstract
The aim of this study was to clarify which cognitive mechanisms underlie Trail Making Test (TMT) direct and derived scores. A comprehensive review of the literature on the topic was carried out to clarify which cognitive factors had been related to TMT performance. Following the review, we explored the relative contribution from working memory, inhibition/interference control, task-switching ability, and visuomotor speed to TMT performance. Forty-one healthy old subjects participated in the study and performed a battery of neuropsychological tests including the TMT, the Digit Symbol subtest [Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (Third Version) (WAIS-III)], a Finger Tapping Test, the Digits Forward and Backward subtests (WAIS-III), Stroop Test, and a task-switching paradigm inspired in the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test. Correlation and regression analyses were used in order to clarify the joint and unique contributions from different cognitive factors to the prediction of TMT scores. The results suggest that TMT-A requires mainly visuoperceptual abilities, TMT-B reflects primarily working memory and secondarily task-switching ability, while B-A minimizes visuoperceptual and working memory demands, providing a relatively pure indicator of executive control abilities.

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Journal ArticleDOI

Trail Making Test Part A and Brain Perfusion Imaging in Mild Alzheimer's Disease

TL;DR: The results suggest that functional activity of the bilateral superior parietal lobules is closely related to performance time on the TMT-A, which might be a promising index of dysfunction of the superiorParietal area among mild AD patients.
Journal ArticleDOI

Major Depressive Disorder Is Associated With Broad Impairments on Neuropsychological Measures of Executive Function: A Meta-Analysis and Review

TL;DR: It is demonstrated that major depressive disorder is reliably associated with impaired performance on neuropsychological measures of EF, and the results are consistent with the theory that MDD is associated with broad impairment in multiple aspects of EF.
Journal ArticleDOI

Insomnia with objective short sleep duration: the most biologically severe phenotype of the disorder.

TL;DR: Evidence is presented that insomnia with objective short sleep duration is the most biologically severe phenotype of the disorder, as it is associated with cognitive-emotional and cortical arousal, activation of both limbs of the stress system, and a higher risk for hypertension, impaired heart rate variability, diabetes, neurocognitive impairment, and mortality.
Journal ArticleDOI

Lesion mapping of cognitive control and value-based decision making in the prefrontal cortex

TL;DR: Two distinct functional-anatomical networks were revealed within the PFC: one associated with cognitive control (response inhibition, conflict monitoring, and switching) and a second associated with value-based decision-making, which included the orbitofrontal, ventromedial, and frontopolar cortex.
Journal ArticleDOI

Age-group differences in speech identification despite matched audiometrically normal hearing: Contributions from auditory temporal processing and cognition

TL;DR: The results suggest that declines in speech perception in older persons are partly caused by cognitive and perceptual changes separate from age-related changes in audiometric sensitivity.
References
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Journal ArticleDOI

“Mini-mental state”: A practical method for grading the cognitive state of patients for the clinician

TL;DR: A simplified, scored form of the cognitive mental status examination, the “Mini-Mental State” (MMS) which includes eleven questions, requires only 5-10 min to administer, and is therefore practical to use serially and routinely.

A practical method for grading the cognitive state of patients for the clinician

TL;DR: The Mini-Mental State (MMS) as mentioned in this paper is a simplified version of the standard WAIS with eleven questions and requires only 5-10 min to administer, and is therefore practical to use serially and routinely.
Book

Using multivariate statistics

TL;DR: In this Section: 1. Multivariate Statistics: Why? and 2. A Guide to Statistical Techniques: Using the Book Research Questions and Associated Techniques.
Journal ArticleDOI

An integrative theory of prefrontal cortex function

TL;DR: It is proposed that cognitive control stems from the active maintenance of patterns of activity in the prefrontal cortex that represent goals and the means to achieve them, which provide bias signals to other brain structures whose net effect is to guide the flow of activity along neural pathways that establish the proper mappings between inputs, internal states, and outputs needed to perform a given task.
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