Vladisauskas Melina, Paz Gabriel O, Nin Verónica, Guillén Jesús A, Belloli Laouen, Delgado Hernán, Miguel Martín A, Macario Cabral Daniela, Shalom Diego E, Forés Anna, Carboni Alejandra, Fernández-Slezak Diego, Goldin Andrea P
Laboratorio de Neurociencia, Universidad Torcuato di Tella, Buenos Aires C1428BCW, Argentina.
Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas (CONICET), Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovación, Buenos Aires C1425FQD, Argentina.
Brain Sci. 2024 Mar 7;14(3):262. doi: 10.3390/brainsci14030262.
Mate Marote is an open-access cognitive training software aimed at children between 4 and 8 years old. It consists of a set of computerized games specifically tailored to train and evaluate Executive Functions (EF), a class of processes critical for purposeful, goal-directed behavior, including working memory, planning, flexibility, and inhibitory control. Since 2008, several studies were performed with this software at children's own schools in interventions supervised in-person by cognitive scientists. After 2015, we incorporated naturalistic, yet controlled, interventions with children's own teachers' help. The platform includes a battery of standardized tests, disguised as games, to assess children's EF. The main question that emerges is whether the results, obtained with these traditional tasks but conducted without the presence of researchers, are comparable to those widely reported in the literature, that were obtained in more supervised settings. In this study, we were able to replicate the expected difficulty and age effects in at least one of the analyzed dependent variables of each employed test. We also report important discrepancies between the expected and the observed response time patterns, specifically for time-constrained tasks. We hereby discuss the benefits and setbacks of a new possible strategy for this type of assessment in naturalistic settings. We conclude that this battery of established EF tasks adapted for its remote usage is appropriate to measure the expected mental processes in naturalistic settings, enriching opportunities to upscale cognitive training interventions at schools. These types of tools can constitute a concerted strategy to bring together educational neuroscience research and real-life practice.
Mate Marote是一款面向4至8岁儿童的开放获取认知训练软件。它由一组专门设计的电脑游戏组成,旨在训练和评估执行功能(EF),这是一类对有目的、目标导向行为至关重要的过程,包括工作记忆、计划、灵活性和抑制控制。自2008年以来,在认知科学家亲自监督的干预措施中,在孩子们自己的学校使用该软件进行了多项研究。2015年之后,我们在孩子们自己老师的帮助下纳入了自然主义但可控的干预措施。该平台包括一系列伪装成游戏的标准化测试,以评估孩子们的执行功能。出现的主要问题是,在没有研究人员在场的情况下通过这些传统任务获得的结果,是否与在更受监督的环境中获得的、文献中广泛报道的结果具有可比性。在这项研究中,我们能够在每个所采用测试的至少一个分析因变量中复制预期的难度和年龄效应。我们还报告了预期和观察到的反应时间模式之间的重要差异,特别是对于有时间限制的任务。在此,我们讨论了在自然主义环境中进行此类评估的一种新的可能策略的优点和缺点。我们得出结论,这组适用于远程使用的既定执行功能任务适合在自然主义环境中测量预期的心理过程,丰富了在学校扩大认知训练干预措施的机会。这些类型的工具可以构成一种协调一致的策略,将教育神经科学研究与现实生活实践结合起来。
Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2022-2-1
Psychol Sci Public Interest. 2008-10-1
Autism Adulthood. 2023-3-1
Monogr Soc Res Child Dev. 2021-3
Handb Clin Neurol. 2020
Front Psychol. 2017-6-20