Mental Acuity
Conditions
Keywords
Senior citizens, mental acuity, memory
Brief summary
The study plans to test the effectiveness of behavioral economics based incentives to promote the daily use of computer programs designed to improve memory and mental acuity. Subjects will be recruited from the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. The primary objective is to determine the impact of structured financial incentives on the number of computer-based cognitive exercises completed during a 3 month intervention period.
Interventions
BEHAVIORALFinancial incentives
Participants are eligible for incentives if they participate in at least 30 games per day.
BEHAVIORALNo incentives
Participants will be given training and access to the software to participate in mental exercises but will not be given financial incentives for participation.
Sponsors
Carnegie Mellon University
University of Pennsylvania
Study design
Allocation
RANDOMIZED
Intervention model
PARALLEL
Primary purpose
PREVENTION
Masking
NONE
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
ALL
Age
55 Years to 80 Years
Healthy volunteers
No
Inclusion criteria
* 55-80 years old
Exclusion criteria
* Unable to read or understand the informed consent form
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Number of activities completed | 6 weeks | The number of memory and cognition enhancement activities played per day using the study provided software will be measured. |
| Performance on activities completed | 6 weeks | Performance is measured by a scoring algorithm designed to estimate levels of memory, attention, cognitive control and processing speed. |
Countries
United States
Outcome results
None listed