COVCOG: Immediate and long-term cognitive improvement after cognitive versus emotion management psychoeducation programs - a randomized trial in covid patients with neuropsychological difficulties.

BACKGROUND: Cognitive difficulties are a frequent complaint in long COVID and persist for more than a year post- infection. There is a lack of evidence-based data on effective intervention strategies. Non-pharmacological intervention programs that are used with other neurological populations have not yet been the subject of controlled trials. COVCOG is a multicentric, randomized trial comparing cognitive intervention and a cognitive-behavioural counselling. METHODS/DESIGN: Patients with long covid are selected and recruited at least three months post-infection. Patients are randomised in a 1:1 ratio into the cognitive (neuropsychological psychoeducation) and affective (emotion management with cognitive-behavioural counselling) intervention arms. The inclusion of 130 patients is planned. The cognitive intervention includes psycho-educational modules on fatigue and sleep, attention and working memory, executive functions and long-term memory. The affective intervention includes modules on emotion recognition and communication, uncertainty management and behavioral activation. The main objective is to reduce cognitive complaints 2 months after the intervention. A Follow-up is also planned at 8 months. DISCUSSION: Given the long-term effects of Covid on cognition and the negative effects of cognitive impairment on quality of life and social participation, it is important to determine whether low-dose, non-pharmacological interventions can be effective. The trial will determine which of the usual types of intervention is the most effective. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Clinicaltrials.gov Number: NCT05167266 (21/12/ 2021).

Examining the impact of experiencing auditory verbal hallucinations from a first-person perspective on the degree of empathy and stigmatization in a group of psychology students: A study using 360° immersive videos.

BACKGROUND: Stigmatization toward psychosis is persistent among mental health professionals (MHPs) and negatively impacts the patients' outcomes. One suggested way of reducing stigmatization is to expose MHPs to simulations of psychotic symptoms. This approach has been associated with an increase in empathy, but also with an increase in the desire of social distance. The addition of an empathic task (ET) has been suggested to neutralize this effect on social distance. The present study aims to (1) examine the effect of a remotely administered 360° immersive video (360IV) simulation on empathy and stigma among psychology students and (2) replicate the neutralizing effect of an ET on social distance. Finally, the potential role of immersive properties on changes will also be explored. METHODS: A 360IV simulating auditory hallucinations was constructed in collaboration with patient partners. 121 psychology students were allocated to one of three conditions: (i) exposure to the 360IV, (ii) exposure to the 360IV and to an ET (360IV + ET), and (iii) no exposure (control). Measures of empathy and stigma (stereotypes and social distance) were collected before and after the interventions. RESULTS: An increase of empathy was observed in the 360IV and 360IV + ET conditions compared to the control condition. There was an increase of stereotypes in all conditions and no effect on social distance. CONCLUSIONS: This study confirms the effectiveness of a 360IV simulation intervention in increasing empathy in psychology students but questions its efficacy in reducing stigma.

How well do you think you remember your personal past? French validation of the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART) and exploration of age effect.

ABSTRACTThis study aimed to validate a French version of the Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART), a 21-item self-report questionnaire developed by Berntsen, D., Hoyle, R. H., & Rubin, D. C. (2019; The Autobiographical Recollection Test (ART): A measure of individual differences in autobiographical memory. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 8(3), 305-318) examining the subjective quality people attribute to their autobiographical memories. It measures seven distinct but correlated dimensions of memories' quality varying between individuals: vividness, narrative coherence, reliving, rehearsal, visual imagery, scene, and life-story relevance. 373 participants aged from 18 to 87 years old were invited to complete the questionnaire by rating on a 7-point Likert scale the degree to which they agree with each item. Demographic data and information about their perception of their memory functioning and satisfaction were also collected. Confirmatory factor analysis confirmed the initial seven-factor structure of the ART. Moreover, results showed desirable psychometric properties, with good internal consistency (.94) and test-retest reliability (.83). This scale was also correlated with participants' perception of memory functioning in daily life. However, there was no correlation with age, confirming prior studies showing that the subjective quality of autobiographical memories does not decline with age. This study thus provides proof of the good psychometric properties of the French version of the ART and promotes its use to explore the subjective quality of autobiographical memories in clinical populations.

Preschoolers' memory recall of new information: relation to parental reminiscing.

The influence of parental reminiscing style (the way parents discuss past events with their children) on the development of children's autobiographical memory has been well documented. The specific mechanisms involved in this effect, however, remain unknown. We explored the association between specific components of parental reminiscing and preschoolers' episodic memory. Fifty-three parent-child dyads (MChild Age = 53.13 months, 29 females) from Belgium were tested twice within a delay of about nine months. At the first time point, parental reminiscing style was assessed via a parent-child discussion of a prior standardised event (a museum visit) focusing on both the structure of parental interactions and the addressed content. At each time point, children were administered with story-recall tasks in the form of true-false recognition about previously heard stories. Generalised linear mixed-effect models were conducted on an item-by-item basis. Results indicated that parental reminiscing is associated with preschoolers' recognition memory performance at both time points, but not all reminiscing components equally influence children's performance. Specifically, parents' concretisations and metamemory talk were found to impact children's memory. The identification of these components provided insights for exploring the processes underlying the reminiscing-memory influence (in-depth encoding of information, binding processes, and metacognition).

Boosting Familiarity-Based Memory Decisions in Alzheimer's Disease: The Importance of Metacognition.

OBJECTIVE: Recent studies in Alzheimer's disease (AD) have suggested that AD patients are not always able to rely on their feeling of familiarity to improve their memory decisions to the same extent as healthy participants. This underuse of familiarity in AD could result from a learned reinterpretation of fluency as a poor cue for memory that would prevent them to attribute a feeling of fluency to a previous encounter. The primary goal of this study was to determine whether AD patients could relearn the association between processing fluency and past exposure after being repeatedly exposed to situations where using this association improves the accuracy of their memory decisions. METHOD: Thirty-nine patients with probable AD were recruited and asked to complete several recognition tests. During these tests, participants were put either in a condition where the positive contingency between fluent processing and previous encounters with an item was systematically confirmed (intervention condition) or in a condition where there was no correlation between fluency and prior exposure (control condition). The efficacy of the intervention was evaluated at three time points (baseline, posttest, and 3-month follow-up). RESULTS: Our results indicated that all AD patients do not benefit to the same extent from the training. Two variables appeared to influence the likelihood that participants increase and maintain their reliance on the fluency cues after the intervention: the ability to detect the fluency manipulation and the preservation of implicit metacognitive skills. CONCLUSION: These findings indicate the importance of metacognition for inferential attribution processes in memory.

Too Much Familiarity! The Developmental Path of the Fluency Heuristic in Children.

We tested whether changes in attribution processes could account for the developmental differences observed in how children's use fluency to guide their memory decisions. Children ranging in age from 4 to 9 years studied a list of familiar or unfamiliar cartoon characters. In Experiment 1 (n = 84), participants completed a recognition test during which the perceptual fluency of some items was enhanced using a prime. In Experiment 2 (n = 96), participants completed a source recollection judgment on their recognition decisions. Primed items were recognized at a higher rate than unprimed items. However, while young children rely on fluency for all items, older children use fluency only for unfamiliar items. This pattern came together with a reduction in familiarity-based-but not recollection-based-memory responses.

Overcoming familiarity illusions in a single case with persistent déjà vu.

While occasional déjà vu is benign in the general population, rare neuropsychological cases with persistent déjà vu have been described in the literature. We report the case of MN, a 25-year-old woman, who suffered a cerebral haemorrhage in the right thalamo-callosal region and experienced recurrent déjà vu episodes. Through clinical interviews and memory tasks related to déjà vu, we assumed that source memory errors and an inappropriate feeling of familiarity (measured by the number of false recognitions) were critically involved in MN's déjà vu. Based on this, we developed the first neuropsychological intervention dedicated to déjà vu. The rationale was to train MN to detect elements that could produce an inappropriate feeling of familiarity and to promote metacognitive awareness about déjà vu. This intervention was effective at reducing the frequency of déjà vu episodes in MN's daily life, as well as the number of false recognitions in memory tasks. In addition to its clinical contribution, this single-case study contributes to the limited literature on patients whose déjà vu is not related to epileptic abnormalities and medial temporal brain damage, and provide supportive evidence of the role of an erroneous feeling of familiarity and of metacognitive processes in déjà vu.

Effects of an intervention combining self-care and self-hypnosis on fatigue and associated symptoms in post-treatment cancer patients: A randomized-controlled trial.

OBJECTIVE: Cancer has a lot of consequences such as fatigue, sleep disturbances, emotional distress, cognitive impairment and reduced physical activity. Some hypnosis-based psychological interventions showed positive effects on fatigue, sleep and emotional distress, but generally focused on breast cancer patients. Our study aimed at assessing the effects of a group intervention combining self-care and self-hypnosis on quality of life of cancer patients. METHODS: Our longitudinal randomized-controlled trial assessed the benefits of the intervention first on fatigue and secondly on associated symptoms (sleep, emotional distress, cognitive impairment and reduced physical activity) of post-treatment cancer patients, and investigated predictors of the evolution of fatigue. All variables were measured with questionnaires and an actigraph (for sleep and physical activity). RESULTS: Ninety five women with different cancers were included in our study. Group-by-time effects were showed for fatigue, sleep, emotional distress and cognitive functioning: symptoms have improved in the intervention group compared to wait-list control group. Three predictors of the evolution of fatigue were revealed: depression, anxiety and worry. CONCLUSIONS: Our group intervention had benefits for post-treatment cancer patients' quality of life. Impacting emotional distress could be important in order to decrease fatigue. Further studies are needed to replicate our results. This intervention could be easily implemented to improve quality of life of cancer patients. Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT03144154). Retrospectively registered on the 1st of May, 2017.

Interactions with the integrative memory model.

The integrative memory model formalizes a new conceptualization of memory in which interactions between representations and cognitive operations within large-scale cerebral networks generate subjective memory feelings. Such interactions allow to explain the complexity of memory expressions, such as the existence of multiples sources for familiarity and recollection feelings and the fact that expectations determine how one recognizes previously encountered information.

An integrative memory model of recollection and familiarity to understand memory deficits.

Humans can recollect past events in details (recollection) and/or know that an object, person, or place has been encountered before (familiarity). During the last two decades, there has been intense debate about how recollection and familiarity are organized in the brain. Here, we propose an integrative memory model which describes the distributed and interactive neurocognitive architecture of representations and operations underlying recollection and familiarity. In this architecture, the subjective experience of recollection and familiarity arises from the interaction between core systems (storing particular kinds of representations shaped by specific computational mechanisms) and an attribution system. By integrating principles from current theoretical views about memory functioning, we provide a testable framework to refine the prediction of deficient versus preserved mechanisms in memory-impaired populations. The case of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is considered as an example because it entails progressive lesions starting with limited damage to core systems before invading step-by-step most parts of the model-related network. We suggest a chronological scheme of cognitive impairments along the course of AD, where the inaugurating deficit would relate early neurodegeneration of the perirhinal/anterolateral entorhinal cortex to impaired familiarity for items that need to be discriminated as viewpoint-invariant conjunctive entities. The integrative memory model can guide future neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies aiming to understand how such a network allows humans to remember past events, to project into the future, and possibly also to share experiences.

A closer look at children's metacognitive skills: The case of the distinctiveness heuristic.

The primary aim of this study was to document the developmental course of distinctiveness effects throughout childhood. Specifically, we examined whether the reduction in false recognition rates that is traditionally observed in children after distinctive encoding could be explained not only by enhanced discrimination between studied and new items but also by the implementation of a conservative response criterion resulting from the use of metacognitive expectations about the quality of memories (i.e., distinctiveness heuristic). Two experiments were conducted in which children in three age groups-4-5, 6-7, and 8-9 years-were asked to study a set of items presented in either pictorial (distinctive) or word (less distinctive) form. In Experiment 1, pictures and words were displayed in two separate lists, a design that is supposed to favor reliance on the distinctiveness heuristic. In Experiment 2, the two types of stimuli were presented within the same list, a design that is supposed to make using the metacognitive heuristic ineffective. Overall, Experiments 1 and 2 provide evidence that children as young as 4 years rely on the distinctiveness heuristic to guide their memory decisions, resulting in a reduction in the false recognition rate when items are presented using a pure-list design (Experiment 1) but not when they are presented using a mixed-list design (Experiment 2). The implications of these findings for our understanding of the development of metacognition and the involvement of metacognitive skills in children's memory performance are discussed.

Hearing "Quack" and Remembering A Duck: Evidence for Fluency Attribution in Young Children.

Previous research has suggested that fluency does not influence memory decisions until ages 7-8. In two experiments (n = 96 and n = 64, respectively), children, aged 4, 6, and 8 years (Experiments 1 and 2), and adults (Experiment 2) studied a list of pictures. Participants completed a recognition test during which each study item was preceded by a sound providing either a highly predictive or mildly predictive context in order to make some test items more conceptually fluent. Overall, highly predictive items were recognized at a higher rate than mildly predictive items demonstrating an earlier development of the fluency heuristic than previously observed. The study provides insight into how children develop metacognitive expectations and when they start to use them to guide their memory responses.

Beyond the experience: Detection of metamemorial regularities.

We examined the mechanisms involved in the development of the easily learned, easily remembered (ELER) heuristic in three groups of young children (4-5 years, 6-7 years, and 8-9 years). A trial-to-acquisition procedure was used to evaluate how much these children's judgment of learning depended on the ELER heuristic. Moreover, a new experimental paradigm, composed of six phases-a pretest, four training phases, and a posttest-was employed to implicitly influence the validity of the ELER association that underlies this metacognitive rule. Results revealed that the ELER heuristic develops early (4-5years), but its use is reduced after implicit training. Furthermore, executive monitoring was found to account for the smaller changes observed in older children (8-9 years) after training. From a developmental perspective, these findings present a coherent picture of children's learning of metacognitive heuristics, wherein early automatic and implicit learning is later followed by effortful control.

Are children conservative, liberal, or metacognitive? Preliminary evidence for the involvement of the distinctiveness heuristic in decision making.

The experiment tested whether young children are able to reduce their false recognition rate after distinctive encoding by implementing a strategic metacognitive rule. The participants, 72 children aged 4, 6, and 9 years, studied two lists of unrelated items. One of these lists was visually displayed (picture condition), whereas the other was presented auditorily (word condition). After each study phase, participants completed recognition tests. Finally, they answered questions about their explicit knowledge of the distinctive encoding effect. The results revealed that even the youngest children in our sample showed a smaller proportion of intrusions in the picture condition than in the word condition. Furthermore, the results of the signal detection analyses were consistent with the hypothesis that the lower rate of false recognitions after picture encoding results from the implementation of a conservative response criterion based on metacognitive expectations (distinctiveness heuristic). Moreover, the absence of correlation between children's explicit knowledge of the distinctiveness rule and their effective use of this metacognitive heuristic seems to indicate that its involvement in memory decisions could be mediated by implicit mechanisms.

The effects of age on objective and subjective recollection after visiting a virtual apartment.

While aging has been associated with decreased retrieval of episodic memory details, subjective ratings about memory quality seem to remain stable. This suggests that subjective memory judgments are based on different information according to age. Here, we tested the hypothesis that older people would rather base their subjective judgments on the retrieval of personal elements (such as emotions and thoughts), whereas younger people would rather base their judgments on the retrieval of event-related elements (such as time, place, and perceptual details). Sixty participants (20 to 79 years old) performed eight actions in a virtual apartment and were then asked to verbally recall each action with a maximum of associated elements and to rate the subjective quality of their memories. The elements reported were classified into "person-related" and "event-related" categories. Executive functions, memory performance on traditional memory tasks, and subjects' perception of memory functioning were also evaluated. Results revealed that aging was associated with reduced retrieval of event-related elements, which was explained by decreasing executive resources. However, age did not affect the retrieval of person-related elements, and the subjective memory judgments of older people were not based on these elements to a greater extent than those of younger people. Finally, our results highlight the value of virtual reality (VR) in memory evaluations since subjects' perception of memory functioning was associated with their performance in the VR task but not in traditional memory tasks.

What Information Do Neuropsychologists Use to Guide their Clinical Decisions? A Survey on Knowledge and Application of Evidence-Based Practice in a French-Speaking Population.

OBJECTIVE: Evidence-based practice (EBP) is an approach that encourages clinicians to base their practice on evidence to improve the quality of patient care and reduce uncertainty in their clinical decisions. However, the state of knowledge and practice of neuropsychologists in French-speaking countries is still unknown. This study aimed to find out what these neuropsychologists know about EBP and whether they use it. METHOD: A questionnaire with 39 questions for French-speaking neuropsychologists was distributed. The questions focused on neuropsychologists' knowledge and use of EBP and information that guide their clinical decisions. RESULTS: A total of 392 respondents started the survey. The data show that only 35% correctly defined EBP and there was confusion between this practice and the strict use of research data. In practice, their decisions are influenced by multiple factors, including the patient's difficulties and advice from peers. Regarding the research, a significant proportion of the sample stated that they did not search the scientific literature frequently. Barriers to accessing scientific information and ineffective article-reading behavior were highlighted. CONCLUSION: A lack of knowledge of EBP among French-speaking neuropsychologists was observed. Furthermore, the factors influencing their decision-making do not clearly fit the definitions of EBP. Information-seeking behaviors show several weaknesses and barriers to the integration of scientific evidence into practice. These results are like those of other studies conducted among psychologists or in other health professions. We will discuss possible courses of action that could be implemented to improve the knowledge and use of EBP.

The Influence of Changes in Daily Life Habits and Well-Being on Fatigue Level During COVID-19 Pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic and its lockdown in March 2020 have led to changes in lifestyle and increased levels of anxiety, depression, and fatigue. This survey examined a number of factors (anxiety state, sleep quality, daily activities, mental load, work-related variables) influencing mental and physical fatigue during lockdown and how these relations have evolved one year later. A cohort of 430 workers and 124 retirees were recruited in April-May 2020 (lockdown period, data set 1), and a subsample (133 workers and 40 retirees) completed the same questionnaire in April-May 2021 (data set 2). Linear regression models showed a significant subjective increase in both physical and mental fatigue in both worker and retiree groups during lockdown, and a supplementary increase in physical fatigue and anxiety level in spring 2021 compared to the lockdown period. During lockdown, anxiety level, concerns about COVID-19, work flexibility, mental load, and sleep metrics were associated with the evolution of fatigue among workers. For retirees, only anxiety and physical activity levels were linked to changes in physical fatigue. In April-May 2021, the only associations which remained significant were those in workers between fatigue and anxiety level and workload. These findings suggest that the increased fatigue levels during the lockdown are likely due to the swift and significant changes in daily routines (such as sleep patterns and work dynamics) and psychological states (including increased anxiety and concerns) prompted by the sanitary crisis. On the other hand, the increase in fatigue observed one year after the beginning of the pandemic seems to result from more psychological factors associated with the health situation.

Parental reminiscing training and preschoolers' memory and metacognition: A randomized controlled trial.

This randomized controlled trial explored the effects of parental reminiscing training on preschoolers' memory and metacognition among French-speaking White parents and their typically developing children (24 females, 20 males; Mmonths = 49.64) in Belgium. Participants were assigned, with age stratification, to the immediate intervention (n = 23) or waiting-list group (n = 21). The assessments were conducted by blind evaluators before the intervention, immediately after, and 6 months later. Resulting specifically from the intervention, parents sustainably improved their reminiscing style (e.g., greater provision of feedback and use of metamemory comments). The effects of the intervention on children's outcomes were, however, less clear. Based on the social-constructivist approach, such effects could be expected to occur later. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).

Impact of e-learning and role play-based training on psychology students' communication skills: a feasibility study.

BACKGROUND: Given the importance of communication skills in the psychologist-patient relationship, several training programs have been proposed. Cumulative microtraining (CMT) has shown positive impacts on communication skills in previous studies. METHODS: The aim of this naturalistic pre-post study was to test the feasibility of a hybrid CMT program and obtain preliminary data on its impact on communication skills in French-speaking third-year psychology students. The training included an e-learning curriculum and role plays. Pre-post measures included recorded peer-to-peer role plays and self-assessments by participants themselves using the Calgary Cambridge Grid (n = 38) and assessed by an independent rater (n = 29) with a checklist focused on objective behaviors and the CARE questionnaire measuring perceived empathy. RESULTS: The results showed increases in most communication skills at different levels. Summarizing, paraphrasing, and structuring skills were significantly increased after training (all P ≤ 0.001), as were self-reported measurements (all P < 0.001), and empathy and confidence assessed by an independent rater (all p < 0.05). CONCLUSION: This study provides new evidence on the impact of CMT, including e-learning and role plays, on both self-rated assessments and assessments by an independent rater who measured communication and empathy in a population of French-speaking students. These findings highlight the importance of implementing such instruction in initial training despite the cost involved. It demonstrates the feasibility of its inclusion in university curriculum, facilitated by the adaptation of theoretical aspects of teaching in e-learning.