A Lego Robot Programming Intervention for Enhancing Older Adult Cognitive Health

Not Applicable

Recruiting

• Conditions: Cognitive Inferential Ability
• Interventions: Behavioral: Lego Robot Programming Active Challenges; Behavioral: Board Games; Behavioral: Lego Robot Programming Procedural Methods

• Registration Number: NCT05341232
• Lead Sponsor: National Taiwan University Hospital

Brief Summary

The population in Taiwan is rapidly aging with an increasing proportion of older persons who experience cognitive difficulties but are otherwise physically healthy. As such there is a critical and urgent need for effective interventions to enhance older adult cognitive health. This present sub-project is part of the larger integrated project that will address this need by conducting cognitive training interventions on community older adults using the National Taiwan Science Education Center (NTSEC) as the public engagement window and collecting research behavioral and neurophysiological data to empirically and objectively examine intervention efficacies. In this sub-project, the investigators implement a clinical trial to evaluate an open-ended, flexible cognitive training intervention in middle to older adults aged 50 yrs or above using a 12-week Lego Robot Programming (Lego RP) protocol developed in the investigators' lab at the Graduate Institute of Brain and Mind Sciences, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University. The Lego RP training requires participants to generate and update abstract mental hypotheses of the effect of program codes on the physical actions of a robot based on how the robot behaves. Such mental processing is thought to drive flexible coordination between neural processes in the brain and benefit a broad range of cognitive abilities in older adults. The investigators target to obtain pre- and post-intervention behavioral and neurophysiological data (including brain imaging indicators) in 40 experimental participants, 40 active control participants, and 40 passive control participants over a period of 3 years.

Detailed Description

The population in Taiwan is rapidly aging with an increasing proportion of older persons who experience cognitive difficulties but are otherwise physically healthy. As such there is a critical and urgent need for effective interventions to enhance older adult cognitive health. This present sub-project is part of the larger integrated project that will address this need by conducting cognitive training interventions on community older adults using the National Taiwan Science Education Center (NTSEC) as the public engagement window and collecting research behavioral and neurophysiological data to empirically and objectively examine intervention efficacies. In this sub-project, the investigators implement a clinical trial to evaluate an open-ended, flexible cognitive training intervention in middle to older adults aged 50 yrs or above using a 12-week Lego Robot Programming (Lego RP) protocol developed in the investigators' lab at the Graduate Institute of Brain and Mind Sciences, College of Medicine, National Taiwan University. The Lego RP training requires participants to generate and update abstract mental hypotheses of the effect of program codes on the physical actions of a robot based on how the robot behaves. Such mental processing is thought to drive flexible coordination between neural processes in the brain and benefit a broad range of cognitive abilities in older adults. The investigators target to obtain pre- and post-intervention behavioral and neurophysiological data (including brain imaging indicators) in 40 experimental participants, 40 active control participants, and 40 passive control participants over a period of 3 years. The investigators will also coordinate with the other sub-projects to assign participants to the different interventions involved as well as research data collection, which is shared. In contrast to previous studies of older adult cognitive training, the investigators expect this present approach, which leverages neurocognitive principles, to result in notable transfer between different cognitive abilities, and meaningful impact on daily functioning. The NTSEC recently seeks to engage the public, particularly children and older adults in STEAM education (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics) to inspire and equip the population with the spirit of learning, discovery, and challenge-seeking, which is thought to raise mental resilience. Thus, the investigators' public outreach and research goals are highly complementary and the work is expected to yield more ecologically valid research data on a novel class of cognitive interventions for cognitive aging using psychological and brain imaging techniques to bridge critical neural mechanistic knowledge gaps. In addition, the research study will apply real public education benefits in society for those approximately 300 older participants who will participate in this study.

Basic Information
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Recruitment & Eligibility
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Study & Design
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Trial Locations

Study Timeline

• Study Start: 2021-09-01
• Study First Submitted: 2022-04-06
• Study First Submitted QC: 2022-04-17
• Study First Posted: 2022-04-22
• Status Verified: 2023-10
• Last Update Submitted: 2023-10-15
• Last Update Posted: 2023-10-17
• Primary Completion: 2024-07
• Study Completion: 2024-07

Recruitment & Eligibility

• Status: RECRUITING
• Sex: All
• Target Recruitment: 120

Inclusion Criteria

• Literate in Mandarin and Taiwanese
• Willing and able to participate in this research protocol in its entirety.
• Age >50

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Exclusion Criteria

• Participated in cognitive-related training in the past two months.
• Diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment (MCI)
• Severe psychological or behavioral disorder that would seriously interfere with the progress of activity
• History of degenerative cognitive disorder.
• Counter-indications for MRI scanning.

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Study & Design

• Study Type: INTERVENTIONAL
• Study Design: PARALLEL

Arm && Interventions

Group	Intervention	Description
Problem-Solving Training	Lego Robot Programming Active Challenges	Participants will learn to program LEGO robots and will be encouraged to actively solve problems.
Problem-Solving Training	Lego Robot Programming Procedural Methods	Participants will learn to program LEGO robots and will be encouraged to actively solve problems.
Board Games	Board Games	Participants will play boards games under a schedule matching the Experimental and Active Comparator arms.
Step-By-Step Training	Lego Robot Programming Procedural Methods	Participants will learn to program LEGO robots and will be instructed step by step.

Primary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Changes of strategic performance during inferential processing	Week 0, Week 12	Changes from pre- to post-intervention in participant coefficients of expression of modeled response strategies in the Rule Inference fMRI task will be assessed.
Changes in the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) score	Week 0, Week 12	Pre- to post-intervention changes in participant MoCA score. Score range from 0 to 30 with higher scores indicating better cognitive ability.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Face Memory	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 48. Higher score indicates better visual face memory.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Verbal Paired Memory	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 32. Higher score indicates better verbal memory and learning.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Family Pictures I & II	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 64. Higher score indicates better visual memory and learning.
Changes of learning rate during inferential processing	Week 0, Week 12	Changes from pre- to post-intervention in participant number of trials to criterion in the Rule Inference fMRI task.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Visual Reproduction I & II	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 104. Higher score indicates better visual memory. For II, recall score range is 0-104; recognition score range is 0-48.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Spatial Span	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 32. Higher score indicates better spatial memory.
Change in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III Block Design	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 68. Higher score indicates better visual processing.
Change in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III Matrix Reasoning	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 26. Higher score indicates better reasoning.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Word Lists I & II	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 36. Higher score indicates better verbal memory and learning. For II, recall score range is 0 to 8; recognition score range is 0 to 24.
Change in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III Vocabulary	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 66. Higher score indicates better vocabulary.
Changes of neural functional activity during inferential processing	Week 0, Week 12	Participants will undergo a Rule Inference fMRI task to infer underlying rules that map color configurations of circles in a triangular arrangement to a target color category within as few tries as possible under active or passive conditions. The goal for participants will be to infer the cue-category association rules using as few cues as possible. The primary outcome measure here is the degree of neural response estimate change in blood oxygen level dependent (BOLD) signal pre- and post-intervention.
Changes of overall accuracy during inferential processing	Week 0, Week 12	Changes from pre- to post-intervention in participant overall accuracy in identifying latent rules in the Rule Inference fMRI task.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Logical Memory I & II	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 75. Higher score indicates better verbal episodic memory.
Change in Wechsler Memory Scale III Digit Span	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 32. Higher score indicates better auditory memory.
Change in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III Digit Symbol	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 133. Higher score indicates better processing speed.
Change in Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale III Arithmetic	Week 0, Week 12	Score range 0 - 22. Higher score indicates better mathematical computation ability.

Secondary Outcome Measures

Name	Time	Method
Changes of neural functional activity during resting-state	Week 0, Week 12	Brain functional activity measured using fMRI during rest with eyes-open.

Trial Locations

Locations (2)

College of Medicine, National Taiwan University; 🇨🇳 Taipei, Taiwan

National Taiwan Science Education Center; 🇨🇳 Taipei, Taiwan