1. Improving prospective memory performance with future event simulation in traumatic brain injury patients
- Author
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Franca Stablum, Gill Terrett, Erica Bertucci, Massimo Zamuner, Giovanna Mioni, Peter G. Rendell, and Antonella Rosato
- Subjects
Adult ,Male ,medicine.medical_specialty ,Traumatic brain injury ,Memory, Episodic ,Neuropsychological Tests ,050105 experimental psychology ,Developmental psychology ,Young Adult ,03 medical and health sciences ,0302 clinical medicine ,Physical medicine and rehabilitation ,Virtual Week ,Future event simulation ,Prospective memory ,Clinical Psychology ,Brain Injuries, Traumatic ,medicine ,Humans ,Computer Simulation ,0501 psychology and cognitive sciences ,Cognitive skill ,Event (probability theory) ,Memory Disorders ,05 social sciences ,Neuropsychology ,General Medicine ,Middle Aged ,medicine.disease ,Healthy Volunteers ,Female ,Psychology ,030217 neurology & neurosurgery ,Independent living - Abstract
Objective Previous studies have shown that traumatic brain injury (TBI) patients have difficulties with prospective memory (PM). Considering that PM is closely linked to independent living it is of primary interest to develop strategies that can improve PM performance in TBI patients. Method This study employed Virtual Week task as a measure of PM, and we included future event simulation to boost PM performance. Study 1 evaluated the efficacy of the strategy and investigated possible practice effects. Twenty-four healthy participants performed Virtual Week in a no strategy condition, and 24 healthy participants performed it in a mixed condition (no strategy – future event simulation). In Study 2, 18 TBI patients completed the mixed condition of Virtual Week and were compared with the 24 healthy controls who undertook the mixed condition of Virtual Week in Study 1. All participants also completed a neuropsychological evaluation to characterize the groups on level of cognitive functioning. Results Study 1 showed that participants in the future event simulation condition outperformed participants in the no strategy condition, and these results were not attributable to practice effects. Results of Study 2 showed that TBI patients performed PM tasks less accurately than controls, but that future event simulation can substantially reduce TBI-related deficits in PM performance. The future event simulation strategy also improved the controls’ PM performance. Conclusions These studies showed the value of future event simulation strategy in improving PM performance in healthy participants as well as in TBI patients. Practitioner points TBI patients performed PM tasks less accurately than controls, confirming prospective memory impairment in these patients. Participants in the future event simulation condition out-performed participants in the no strategy condition. Future event simulation can substantially reduce TBI-related deficits in PM performance. Future event simulation strategy also improved the controls’ PM performance.
- Published
- 2017