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As the American population ages, researchers across the country are seeking methods to preserve cognition. Studies evaluating whether low-impact physical activity can positively affect cognition have not shown great results, Woods says, but moderate to strenuous exercise indeed has shown noteworthy benefit. Likewise, cognitive training has shown potential for slowing certain aspects of cognitive aging. In fact, the new study by Woods and co-principal investigators Michael Marsiske, PhD, an associate professor of clinical and health psychology at UF’s College of Public Health and Health Professions, and Ronald Cohen, PhD, Evelyn F. McKnight chair for clinical translational research in cognitive aging, seeks to build upon Marsiske’s and others’ previous research showing that for older adults, certain cognitive training regimens can have a lasting benefit on cognitive ability and the ability to maintain better driving performance. Twenty years ago, Marsiske and colleagues launched a multisite NIA-funded clinical trial called ACTIVE, or Advanced Cognitive Training in Independent and Vital Elderly. “What we found in that study after following 3,000 people for a decade was training was generally effective and durable,” Marsiske says. “We still detected benefits of training up to 10 years after training, which was kind of surprising. The analogy we keep using is that you would go to the gym for five weeks and never again and still see the benefits a decade later — small but clearly discernible differences.” One area of focus was particularly effective: what is called “useful field-of-view,” or how much information a person can take in at a glance, which is critical for driving and tends to restrict with aging. “People who receive this useful field-ofview training showed, according to archival state records, about a 50 percent reduction in motor vehicle crash rates because they were taking in information differently," Marsiske says. PHOTO BY MINDY C. MILLER The ACT research team will use state-of-the-art neuroimaging to measure changes in the brain in response to cognitive training by itself and in conjunction with transcranial direct current stimulation, or tDCS. "The goal is to find out whether learning capacity can be increased in older adults by coupling cognitive training with electrical stimulation of the brain," says Ronald Cohen, PhD, right, with Michael Marsiske, PhD. floridaphysician.med.ufl.edu SUMMER 2 0 1 7 | 7


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