Effects of the egg protein hydrolysate NWT-03 on cognitive function in men and women with the metabolic syndrome: a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study.

The metabolic syndrome is associated with cardiovascular diseases and cognitive decline. The egg protein hydrolysate NWT-03 has shown to improve cardiovascular risk factors in humans. This study investigated whether NWT-03 also has an effect on cognitive function.

Proactive motor control within and between hands: Effects of age, motor set, and cue type.

Several studies have reported that proactive motor control in a cued four-finger choice reaction task proceeds more efficiently with a 2-hands motor set (two fingers on each hand) than with a 1-hand motor set (four fingers on one hand). According to the Grouping Model, this is because the 2-hands motor set recruits distinct left and right hand representations located in separate cerebral hemispheres, whereas the 1-hand motor set recruits partially overlapping neural areas grouped together in one hemisphere. The latter neural organization increases neuromotor noise, thereby complicating proactive motor selection.

Aerobic Exercise Training Improves Cerebral Blood Flow and Executive Function: A Randomized, Controlled Cross-Over Trial in Sedentary Older Men.

Background: Physical activity may attenuate age-related cognitive decline by improving cerebrovascular function. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate effects of aerobic exercise training on cerebral blood flow (CBF), which is a sensitive physiological marker of cerebrovascular function, in sedentary older men.

Methods: Seventeen apparently healthy men, aged 60-70 years and with a BMI between 25 and 35 kg/m, were included in a randomized, controlled cross-over trial.

Both facilitatory and inhibitory impairments underlie age-related differences of proactive cognitive control across the adult lifespan.

We investigated two components of proactive cognitive control, response facilitation and response inhibition, in an adult lifespan sample (N=544, age range=18-91years) by administering two response-preparation tasks: a procue task, primarily involving facilitation, and an anticue task, involving both facilitation and inhibition. Cues in both tasks corresponded with the index and middle fingers of either the left or right hand. After a random preparation interval (PI) of 100-850ms following the onset of the cue signal, a single-target stimulus indicated the required response.

Benefits of Substituting Sitting with Standing and Walking in Free-Living Conditions for Cardiometabolic Risk Markers, Cognition and Mood in Overweight Adults.

We investigated whether substituting sitting with standing and self-perceived light walking in free-living conditions would improve cardiometabolic risk factors, mood, and cognition in overweight/obese adults. In a randomized, cross-over study, 24 (m/f: 13/11) sedentary overweight/obese participants (64 ± 7 years, BMI 29 ± 2 kg/m) followed two activity regimens of each 4 days in free-living conditions: "Sit": sitting 13.5 h/day, standing 1.

Foresight beats hindsight: The neural correlates underlying motor preparation in the pro-/anti-cue paradigm.

Background: Human motor behaviors are characterized by both, reactive and proactive mechanisms. Yet, studies investigating the neural correlates of motor behavior almost exclusively focused on reactive motor processes. Here, we employed the motor preparation paradigm to systematically study proactive motor control in an imaging environment.

Switch hands! Mapping proactive and reactive cognitive control across the life span.

We investigated the effects of age on proactive and reactive cognitive control in a large population sample of 809 individuals, ranging in age between 5 and 97 years. For that purpose, we used an anticue paradigm, which required a consistent remapping of cue location and response hand: Left-sided cues required right-hand responses and vice versa. After a random preparation interval of 100-850 ms, these anticues were followed by a target stimulus, which prompted a response with the index or middle finger of 1 of 2 hands.

The integration of sequential aiming movements: Switching hand and direction at the first target.

Movement times to a single target are typically shorter compared to when movement to a second target is required. This one target movement time advantage has been shown to emerge when participants use a single hand throughout the target sequence and when there is a switch between hands at the first target. Our goal was to investigate the lacuna in the movement integration literature surrounding the interactive effects between switching hands and changing movement direction at the first target.

Switch hands! Mapping temporal dynamics of proactive manual control with anticues.

This study uses a novel behavioral paradigm-the anticue task-to investigate the temporal dynamics of proactive control aimed at the resolution of response conflict in the manual motor system. The anticue task is a 4-choice reaction time (RT) task, with left and right anticues indicating mirror-symmetrical response hands. In particular, anticues require participants to prepare fingers on the hand opposite to the side of the cue (counter-corresponding mapping), which contrasts with the more standard procues that prompt participants to prepare fingers on the hand spatially in line with the cue (corresponding mapping).

Sequential aiming with one and two limbs: effects of target size.

It is well reported that movement times to the first target in a two-target sequence are slower than when a single target response is required. This one-target advantage has been shown to emerge when the two-target sequence is performed with the same limb and when the first and second segments within the sequence are performed with different limbs (i.e.

Effect of resistance-type exercise training with or without protein supplementation on cognitive functioning in frail and pre-frail elderly: secondary analysis of a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial.

Physical activity has been proposed as one of the most effective strategies to prevent cognitive decline. Protein supplementation may exert an additive effect. The effect of resistance-type exercise training with or without protein supplementation on cognitive functioning in frail and pre-frail elderly people was assessed in a secondary analysis.

Aging and response interference across sensory modalities.

Advancing age is associated with decrements in selective attention. It was recently hypothesized that age-related differences in selective attention depend on sensory modality. The goal of the present study was to investigate the role of sensory modality in age-related vulnerability to distraction, using a response interference task.

Both hand position and movement direction modulate visual attention.

The current study explored effects of continuous hand motion on the allocation of visual attention. A concurrent paradigm was used to combine visually concealed continuous hand movements with an attentionally demanding letter discrimination task. The letter probe appeared contingent upon the moving right hand passing through one of six positions.

Response-repetition effects depend on motor set: evidence for anatomical coding in response selection.

Successful motor performance requires a process of response selection that chooses the correct response out of a set of possible ones. Most theories of response selection assume that this selection process operates on spatial codes, which define the location of stimuli and responses in environmental coordinates, with little or no role for the anatomical codes of the effectors involved. In this study, we tested this assumption by investigating response-repetition effects in a response-cuing paradigm using two motor sets (fingers on one hand vs.

The impact of protein supplementation on cognitive performance in frail elderly.

Purpose: Maintenance of cognitive abilities is important for elderly to stay independent. With the aging of the population, the call for modifiable factors is emerging. Dietary protein might improve cognitive performance; however, this has hardly been studied.

Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D is associated with cognitive executive function in Dutch prefrail and frail elderly: a cross-sectional study exploring the associations of 25-hydroxyvitamin D with glucose metabolism, cognitive performance and depression.

Objectives: The primary objective was to explore the possible association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25[OH]D) and vitamin D intake with markers of glucose metabolism, depression, and cognitive performance. In addition, we examined to what extent the associations between vitamin D and cognitive performance were modified or mediated by fasting plasma glucose (FPG) levels.

Design, Setting, And Participants: Cross-sectional study using data of 127 frail or prefrail Dutch elderly, aged 65 years or older.

Patients with type 2 diabetes show a greater decline in muscle mass, muscle strength, and functional capacity with aging.

Background: The loss of muscle mass with aging reduces muscle strength, impairs functional capacity, and increases the risk of developing chronic metabolic disease. It has been suggested that the development of type 2 diabetes results in a more rapid decline in muscle mass, strength, and functional capacity.

Objective: To investigate the impact of type 2 diabetes on muscle mass, strength, and functional capacity in an older population.

Continuous hand movement induces a far-hand bias in attentional priority.

Previous research on the interaction between manual action and visual perception has focused on discrete movements or static postures and discovered better performance near the hands (the near-hand effect). However, in everyday behaviors, the hands are usually moving continuously between possible targets. Therefore, the current study explored the effects of continuous hand motion on the allocation of visual attention.

The closer the better: Hand proximity dynamically affects letter recognition accuracy.

A growing literature has suggested that processing of visual information presented near the hands is facilitated. In this study, we investigated whether the near-hands superiority effect also occurs with the hands moving. In two experiments, participants performed a cyclical bimanual movement task requiring concurrent visual identification of briefly presented letters.

Coordinated flexibility: how initial gaze position modulates eye-hand coordination and reaching.

Reaching to targets in space requires the coordination of eye and hand movements. In two experiments, we recorded eye and hand kinematics to examine the role of gaze position at target onset on eye-hand coordination and reaching performance. Experiment 1 showed that with eyes and hand aligned on the same peripheral start location, time lags between eye and hand onsets were small and initiation times were substantially correlated, suggesting simultaneous control and tight eye-hand coupling.

Response preparation in Parkinson's disease: automatic vs. controlled processing.

Using a finger cuing paradigm, we investigated response preparation in Parkinson's disease (PD). The central question was whether PD individuals are differentially affected by preparatory cues that specify a more automatic response set configuration (that induces within-hand preparation) as opposed to a more controlled one (that induces between-hands preparation). Reaction times (RTs) and error rates were measured in 20 non-demented individuals with PD and 20 healthy control participants with a long and short preparation interval (500 ms and 2000 ms).

Spared within-hands but impaired between-hands response preparation in aging.

Objectives: Older people can use advance information to prepare a subset of finger responses. It is debated, however, whether aging affects the preparation of finger responses on two hands (between-hands preparation) more strongly than the preparation of finger responses on one hand (within-hands preparation). The present study examined the role of temporal uncertainty in this issue.

Automatic selective attention as a function of sensory modality in aging.

Objectives: It was recently hypothesized that age-related differences in selective attention depend on sensory modality (Guerreiro, M. J. S.

Executive control in Parkinson's disease: effects of dopaminergic medication and deep brain stimulation on anti-cue keypress performance.

Using an anti-cue keypress task, we examined executive control in Parkinson's disease (PD) patients treated with deep brain stimulation (DBS) of the subthalamic nucleus (STN) and dopaminergic medication. Across sessions, we varied stimulation (on, off) and dopaminergic medication (on, off). Reaction time (RT) results of the PD patients and their age-matched controls showed a consistent pattern of RT costs and benefits generated by anti-cues with short and long preparation intervals, respectively.

Modulating Fitts's Law: perceiving targets at the last placeholder.

Fitts's Law predicts increasing movement times (MTs) with increasing movement amplitudes; however, when targets are placed in a structured perceptual array containing placeholders, MTs to targets in the last position are shorter than predicted. We conducted three experiments to determine if this modulation has a perceptual cause. Experiment 1, which used extremely diminished (three pixel) placeholders, showed that the modulation is not due to perceptual interference from neighboring placeholders.