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| 2. |
- Etemadi, Leila, et al.
(författare)
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Effects of working memory load and CS-US intervals on delay eyeblink conditioning
- 2023
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Ingår i: npj Science of Learning. - 2056-7936. ; 8, s. 1-5
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Eyeblink conditioning is used in many species to study motor learning and make inferences about cerebellar function. However, the discrepancies in performance between humans and other species combined with evidence that volition and awareness can modulate learning suggest that eyeblink conditioning is not merely a passive form of learning that relies on only the cerebellum. Here we explored two ways to reduce the influence of volition and awareness on eyeblink conditioning: (1) using a short interstimulus interval, and (2) having participants do working memory tasks during the conditioning. Our results show that participants trained with short interstimulus intervals (150 ms and 250 ms) produce very few conditioned responses after 100 trials. Participants trained with a longer interstimulus interval (500 ms) who simultaneously did working memory tasks produced fewer conditioned responses than participants who watched a movie during the training. Our results suggest that having participants perform working memory tasks during eyeblink conditioning can be a viable strategy for studying cerebellar learning that is absent of influences from awareness and volition. This could enhance the comparability of the results obtained in human studies with those in animal models.
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| 3. |
- Judd, N, et al.
(författare)
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Schooling substantially improves intelligence, but neither lessens nor widens the impacts of socioeconomics and genetics
- 2022
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Ingår i: NPJ science of learning. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2056-7936. ; 7:1, s. 33-
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Schooling, socioeconomic status (SES), and genetics all impact intelligence. However, it is unclear to what extent their contributions are unique and if they interact. Here we used a multi-trait polygenic score for cognition (cogPGS) with a quasi-experimental regression discontinuity design to isolate how months of schooling relate to intelligence in 6567 children (aged 9–11). We found large, independent effects of schooling (β ~ 0.15), cogPGS (β ~ 0.10), and SES (β ~ 0.20) on working memory, crystallized (cIQ), and fluid intelligence (fIQ). Notably, two years of schooling had a larger effect on intelligence than the lifetime consequences, since birth, of SES or cogPGS-based inequalities. However, schooling showed no interaction with cogPGS or SES for the three intelligence domains tested. While schooling had strong main effects on intelligence, it did not lessen, nor widen the impact of these preexisting SES or genetic factors.
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| 4. |
- Langensee, Lara, et al.
(författare)
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Interplay of socioeconomic status, cognition, and school performance in the ABCD sample
- 2024
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Ingår i: npj Science of Learning. - 2056-7936. ; 9:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Coming from a disadvantaged background can have negative impact on an individual’s educational trajectory. Some people however seem unaffected and cope well with the demands and challenges posed by school education, despite growing up in adverse conditions, a phenomenon termed academic resilience. While it is uncertain which underlying factors make some people more likely to circumvent unfavorable odds than others, both socioeconomic status (SES) and cognitive ability have robustly been linked to school performance. The objective of the present work is to investigate if individual cognitive abilities and SES interact in their effect on grades. For this purpose, we analyzed SES, cognitive, and school performance data from 5001 participants from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study. Ordinal logistic regression models suggest similar patterns of associations between three SES measures (parental education, income-to-needs ratio, and neighborhood deprivation) and grades at two timepoints, with no evidence for interaction effects between SES and time. Parental education and income-to-needs ratio were associated with grades at both timepoints, irrespective of whether cognitive abilities were modeled or not. Neighborhood deprivation, in contrast, was only a statistically significant predictor of reported grades when cognitive abilities were not factored in. Cognitive abilities interacted with parental education level, meaning that they could be a safeguard against effects of SES on school performance.
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| 5. |
- Olivo, Gaia, et al.
(författare)
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Exploring brain plasticity in developmental dyslexia through implicit sequence learning
- 2024
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Ingår i: npj Science of learning. - : Springer Nature. - 2056-7936. ; 9:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Developmental dyslexia (DD) is defined as difficulties in learning to read even with normal intelligence and adequate educational guidance. Deficits in implicit sequence learning (ISL) abilities have been reported in children with DD. We investigated brain plasticity in a group of 17 children with DD, compared with 18 typically developing (TD) children, after two sessions of training on a serial reaction time (SRT) task with a 24-h interval. Our outcome measures for the task were: a sequence-specific implicit learning measure (ISL), entailing implicit recognition and learning of sequential associations; and a general visuomotor skill learning measure (GSL). Gray matter volume (GMV) increased, and white matter volume (WMV) decreased from day 1 to day 2 in cerebellar areas regardless of group. A moderating effect of group was found on the correlation between WMV underlying the left precentral gyrus at day 2 and the change in ISL performance, suggesting the use of different underlying learning mechanisms in DD and TD children during the ISL task. Moreover, DD had larger WMV in the posterior thalamic radiation compared with TD, supporting previous reports of atypical development of this structure in DD. Further studies with larger sample sizes are warranted to validate these results.
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| 6. |
- Samuelsson, Robin, 1985-
(författare)
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The two-faced process of learning and the importance of Janus-faced solutions
- 2023
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Ingår i: npj Science of learning. - : Springer Nature. - 2056-7936. ; 8:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Significant developments have been made to our understanding of how children learn, putting essential pieces to the puzzle of what it means to be human. Theories of learning are, however, headed in diverging directions, and this perspective paper argues that this dispersion can recapitulate recurring schisms in developmental and learning sciences about learning as a predominantly individually constructed or socially transferred process. It is argued that this opposition is unnecessary and that an encompassing understanding of learning should consider both directions. This conciliatory approach considers how humans learn from others and what is known while exploring new solutions. This is important for understanding learning in childhood, seeing learning as a simultaneously individual and social process where humans actively explore and exploit knowledge about the world around them. Framing learning by the metaphor of a Janus face, looking back at what is known while exploring new knowledge, becomes illuminating for understanding learning and provides an essential background for designing educational practices based on active learning.
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| 7. |
- Sauce, B, et al.
(författare)
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Change by challenge: A common genetic basis behind childhood cognitive development and cognitive training
- 2021
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Ingår i: NPJ science of learning. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2056-7936. ; 6:1, s. 16-
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The interplay of genetic and environmental factors behind cognitive development has preoccupied multiple fields of science and sparked heated debates over the decades. Here we tested the hypothesis that developmental genes rely heavily on cognitive challenges—as opposed to natural maturation. Starting with a polygenic score (cogPGS) that previously explained variation in cognitive performance in adults, we estimated its effect in 344 children and adolescents (mean age of 12 years old, ranging from 6 to 25) who showed changes in working memory (WM) in two distinct samples: (1) a developmental sample showing significant WM gains after 2 years of typical, age-related development, and (2) a training sample showing significant, experimentally-induced WM gains after 25 days of an intense WM training. We found that the same genetic factor, cogPGS, significantly explained the amount of WM gain in both samples. And there was no interaction of cogPGS with sample, suggesting that those genetic factors are neutral to whether the WM gains came from development or training. These results represent evidence that cognitive challenges are a central piece in the gene-environment interplay during cognitive development. We believe our study sheds new light on previous findings of interindividual differences in education (rich-get-richer and compensation effects), brain plasticity in children, and the heritability increase of intelligence across the lifespan.
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| 8. |
- Wiklund-Hörnqvist, Carola, et al.
(författare)
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Neural activations associated with feedback and retrieval success
- 2017
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Ingår i: npj Science of learning. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2056-7936. ; 2:12
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- There is substantial behavioral evidence for a phenomenon commonly called “the testing effect”, i.e. superior memory performance after repeated testing compared to re-study of to-be-learned materials. However, considerably less is known about the underlying neuro-cognitive processes that are involved in the initial testing phase and thus underlies the actual testing effect. Here, we investigated functional brain activity related to test-enhanced learning with feedback. Subjects learned foreign vocabulary across three consecutive tests with correct-answer feedback. Functional brain-activity responses were analyzed in relation to retrieval and feedback events, respectively. Results revealed up-regulated activity in fronto-striatal regions during the first successful retrieval, followed by a marked reduction in activity as a function of improved learning. Whereas feedback improved behavioral performance across consecutive tests, feedback had a negligable role after the first successful retrieval for functional brain-activity modulations. It is suggested that the beneficial effects of test-enhanced learning is regulated by feedback-induced updating of memory representations, mediated via the striatum, that might underlie the stabilization of memory commonly seen in behavioral studies of the testing effect.
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| 9. |
- Youn, C., et al.
(författare)
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Genetic associations with learning over 100 days of practice
- 2022
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Ingår i: Npj Science of Learning. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2056-7936. ; 7:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cognitive performance is both heritable and sensitive to environmental inputs and sustained practice over time. However, it is currently unclear how genetic effects on cognitive performance change over the course of learning. We examine how polygenic scores (PGS) created from genome-wide association studies of educational attainment and cognitive performance are related to improvements in performance across nine cognitive tests (measuring perceptual speed, working memory, and episodic memory) administered to 131 adults (N = 51, ages = 20-31, and N = 80, ages = 65-80 years) repeatedly across 100 days. We observe that PGS associations with performance on a given task can change over the course of learning, with the specific pattern of change in associations differing across tasks. PGS correlations with pre-test to post-test scores may mask variability in how soon learning occurs over the course of practice. The associations between PGS and learning do not appear to simply reconstitute patterns of association between baseline performance and subsequent learning. Associations involving PGSs, however, were small with large confidence intervals. Intensive longitudinal research such as that described here may be of substantial value for clarifying the genetics of learning when implemented as far larger scale.
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