How Goal Cue and Motor Activity Modulate Working Memory Performance in Preschoolers?

Working memory (WM) development is considered as a major source of cognitive development. Nevertheless, preschoolers are well known for their poor performance in WM tasks. We suggested that this poor performance results from goal neglect, which would hamper the setting of maintenance strategies. Previous studies have shown that preschoolers’ WM performance can be improved in particular contexts, such as game situation because it can provide cues to support goal maintenance (Bertrand & Camos, 2015; Istomina, 1975). The present experiment aimed at disentangling the effect of two types of cues, exogenous and endogenous, in 5- to 7-year-old children's recall performance. Based on previous findings, a shopping stall was used as exogenous cue and walking played the role of an endogenous cue. The shopping stall provides an exogenous cue because it helps maintaining the goal, i.e., why children had to memorize the series of fruits and vegetables, while walking can provide an endogenous cue as the end of the walk coincides with recall time. Contrary to our hypotheses, we did not observe any improvement of WM performance in conditions with the shopping stall as potential goal cue whereas a detrimental effect of walking was observed in all age groups. We proposed that the latter effect resulted from the distracting of attention from attention-based maintenance activities, and that preschoolers' poor WM performance is not fundamentally due to goal neglect.

No Evidence that Smartphone Notifications Lead to Goal-Neglect

These days, young people report to be in a state of permanent alertness due to their smartphones. This state has been defined as smartphone vigilance, an awareness that one can always get connected to others in combination with a permanent readiness to respond to incoming smartphone notifications. We argue that receiving a notification makes users vigilant and activates goals (e.g., checking the message) that interfere with other goals needed to perform a task. We thus hypothesized that smartphone vigilance impairs maintenance of current task-goals in working memory, resulting in increased goal-neglect. To test this hypothesis, we conducted a preregistered experiment that examined the effect of smartphone vigilance (incoming notifications) on goal-neglect in a modified Stroop task. We found evidence that participants perceived notifications as distracting, but vigilance did not lead to increased goal-neglect. To the contrary, there was tentative evidence that vigilant participants performed better at the task.

Inattention and task switching performance: the role of predictability, working memory load and goal neglect

Inattention is a symptom of many clinical disorders including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and is thought to be primarily related to limitations in working memory. In two studies, we investigated the implications of inattention for task switching performance. In study one, we measured task switching performance using predictable and unpredictable conditions in adults who self-rated inattention and other ADHD-related tendencies. Tasks required proactive control and reactive control, respectively, under both high and low working memory loads. Results revealed that inattentive, but not hyperactive/impulsive traits, predicted switch costs when switching was predictable and working memory load was high. None of the ADHD traits were related to unpredictable switch costs. Study two was designed to: (1) de-confound the role of proactive control and the need to keep track of task order in the predictable task switching paradigm; (2) investigate whether goal neglect, an impairment related to working memory, could explain the relationship between inattention and predictable task switching. Results revealed that neither predictability nor the need to keep track of the task order led to the association between switch costs and inattention, but instead it was the tendency for those high in inattention to neglect preparatory proactive control, especially when reactive control options were available.

Personally salient, emotionally negative task contexts provoke goal neglect in depression

BackgroundGoal neglect refers to a dissociation between intended and actual action. Although commonly associated with frontal brain damage, this phenomenon is also characteristic of clinical depression. To date, tests of goal neglect typically require individuals to switch between subtasks populated with neutral stimuli. This study examined the impact of affective and personally salient stimulus contexts on goal neglect in clinical depression.MethodsParticipants were randomly allocated to either positively or negatively-valenced versions of the Affective Six Elements Test (A-SET). We hypothesised that depressed individuals (n = 30) would exhibit an overall impairment in A-SET performance by neglecting entire subtasks and allocating suboptimal time to each task, relative to never-depressed peers (n = 30), with effects being strongest for the negatively-valenced version.ResultsFindings showed that depressed individuals exhibited specific deficits, relative to controls on these measures in the negative A-SET only, with a magnitude comparable to that found in brain injured patients.ConclusionsIndividuals with depression are impaired in their ability to monitor performance and implement strategies that are optimal for the purpose of pursuing an overarching goal when the task context is negatively-valenced. Potential mechanisms are discussed.

Personally salient, emotionally negative task contexts provoke goal neglect in depression

Goal neglect refers to a dissociation between intended and actual action. Although commonly associated with frontal brain damage, this phenomenon is also characteristic of clinical depression. To date, tests of goal neglect typically require individuals to switch between subtasks populated with neutral stimuli. This study examined the impact of affective and personally salient stimulus contexts on goal neglect in clinical depression. Participants were randomly allocated to either positively or negatively-valenced versions of the Affective Six Elements Test (A-SET). We hypothesized that depressed individuals (n=30) would exhibit an overall impairment in A-SET performance by neglecting entire subtasks and allocating suboptimal time to each task, relative to never-depressed peers (n=30), with effects being strongest for the negatively-valenced version. Results showed that depressed individuals exhibited specific deficits, relative to controls on these measures in the negative A-SET only, with a magnitude comparable to that found in brain injured patients. Potential mechanisms are discussed.

On the Use of Virtual Reality as an Outcome Measure in Neuropsychological Rehabilitation

Despite the prevalence of executive dysfunction across multiple neurological and psychiatric conditions, there have been few validated rehabilitative interventions targeting it. One intervention holding promise for patients with executive dysfunc­tion is Robertson’s Goal Management Training (GMT; Robertson, 1996). GMT is based on Duncan’s (1986) theory of goal neglect (or failure to execute intentions), in which disorganized behavior is attributed to impaired construction and use of “goal lists,” considered to direct behavior by controlling actions that promote or oppose task completion. GMT attempts to ameliorate goal neglect through verbally mediated, metacognitive strategies that systematically target planning abilities by teach­ing individuals to structure their intentions. Through presentations, discussions, exercises, and homework assignments, GMT trains participants to use strategies like stopping and orienting to relevant information, partitioning goals into more easily managed subgoals, encoding and retaining goals, and monitoring performance. Investigations into the efficacy of GMT have been promising in both normal older adults and in patients with acquired brain injury (ABI). In order to investigate the efficacy of GMT for older adults with cognitive complaints, van Hooren and colleagues (2007) randomly assigned 69 normal, community-dwelling adults age 55 years or older to a six-week GMT program or to a waitlist control group. After the intervention, participants from the GMT group reported significantly fewer anxiety symptoms, were significantly less annoyed by their cognitive failures, and reported improved ability to manage their executive failures as com­pared to control participants. Though this study reported positive results for subjective outcome measures, the intervention showed no effect on the Stroop Colour Word Test (Houx, Jolles, & Vreeling, 1993; Stroop, 1935). Levine and colleagues (2000) reported on 30 traumatic brain injury (TBI) patients who were randomly assigned to receive a brief trial (1-hour session) of GMT or motor skills training. Upon completion of the intervention, the GMT group, but not the motor skills group, showed significant improvement on paper-and-pencil tasks designed to mimic everyday executive tasks that are problematic for patients with goal neglect.