Examining the contributions of placebo effects in cognitive training

项目总结/摘要 这个项目解决了关于认知训练的益处在多大程度上 可能至少部分反映了安慰剂效应。认知训练越来越多地被研究和应用， 一种增强健康中年人认知能力以及改善和/或 预防可能存在ADRD风险的个体的年龄相关认知功能下降。虽然现存的数据 这表明，精心设计的认知训练范式可以产生积极的现实世界的认知变化， 功能，一些研究人员认为，认知训练的积极影响可能，事实上， 反映安慰剂效应。这种批评源于这样一个事实，即使是设计最好的认知训练研究， 参与者不可能真正对状况视而不见。尽管许多认知训练研究试图 参与者对培训的意图或目的的认识（例如，使用惰性控制训练， 作为一种积极的干预措施，这是合理的），因为这种控制训练的经验在关键方面必然有所不同 然而，从积极的培训经验来看， 研究能够直观地了解他们的状况和相关的期望，然后显示出植根于 仅仅是在这些期望中。尽管这一建议经常出现在过去几年的评论中， 多年来，几乎没有实证研究直接解决安慰剂效应是否可能在认知中起作用。 培训和这种影响是否可以解释该领域以前的结果的程度。这里我们 我建议通过一项大规模的研究来克服这一领域的根本差距， 研究认知训练中的安慰剂效应。特别是，从外部领域吸取教训， 严格检查安慰剂效应的诱导，我们利用“纯期望”方法（即，口头 告诉参与者惰性训练方案将增强他们的认知功能）和“联想 “学习”方法（即，配对训练与主观经验的改善性能），试图 有目的地驱动最大振幅安慰剂效应。这不仅有助于解决近端 关于安慰剂是否在该领域产生影响的争议，但如果发现这种影响，它将作为一个 未来研究的基准（例如，以潜在地利用这种影响）。我们将研究如何大小这样的 影响可能在不同年龄组（年轻人和老年人），不同认知领域（例如，流动智力， 工作记忆，选择性注意力），以及跨测试环境（实验室内与远程）。最后，作为外部 领域已经表明，安慰剂反应性的程度可能存在个体差异，我们将 还检查一组个体差异变量（例如，个性）作为这些可能的主持人 差异这项研究将提供一个独特的和基础的数据集，直接和严格的解决方案， 认知训练效果可以被安慰剂解释和/或增强的程度，以及 为今后防治ADRD的干预措施提供信息。

Project Summary/Abstract This project addresses fundamental controversies regarding the extent to which benefits of cognitive training may reflect, at least in part, placebo effects. Cognitive training is increasingly studied and applied as a potential approach to enhance cognitive capabilities in healthy young-to-middle-age adults as well to ameliorate and/or prevent age-related cognitive decline in individuals that may be at risk for developing ADRD. While extant data suggest that well-designed cognitive training paradigms can produce positive real-world change in cognitive functions, some researchers have suggested that the positive effects attributed to cognitive training may, in fact, reflect placebo effects. This criticism stems from the fact that, in even the best designed cognitive training studies, participants cannot be truly blinded to condition. While many cognitive training studies attempt to blind participants to the intent or purpose of the training (e.g., using an inert control training that participants might find plausible as an active intervention), because such control training experiences necessarily differ in key ways from the active training experiences, it has nevertheless been suggested that participants in cognitive training studies are able to intuit their condition and associated expectations and then show outcomes that are rooted purely in these expectations. Despite this suggestion appearing frequently in commentaries over the past several years, there exists little empirical work that directly addresses whether placebo effects may be at play in cognitive training and whether such effects can be of a magnitude that explains previous results in the field. Here we propose to overcome this fundamental gap in the field with a large-scale research study designed to explicitly examine placebo effects in cognitive training. In particular, taking lessons from outside domains that have more rigorously examined the induction of placebo effects, we utilize both “pure expectation” methods (i.e., verbally telling participants that an inert training protocol will enhance their cognitive functions) and “associative learning” methods (i.e., pairing training with subjectively experienced improved performance) in the attempt to purposefully drive maximal amplitude placebo effects. This will not only serve to resolve the proximal controversy regarding whether placebo effects in the domain, but if such effects are found, it will serve as a benchmark for future research (e.g., to potentially harness such effects). We will examine how the size of such effects may differ across age groups (younger and older adults), across cognitive domains (e.g., fluid intelligence, working memory, selective attention), and across testing contexts (in-lab versus remote). Finally, as outside domains have shown that there can be individual differences in the extent of placebo-responsiveness, we will also examine a set of individual difference variables (e.g., personality) as possible moderators for these differences. This research will provide a unique and foundational dataset that addresses directly and in a rigorous manner the extent to which cognitive training effects can be explained by, and/or augmented by, placebos, and inform future interventions addressing ADRD.