AUTHOR=Wang Man-Ying , Chang Chien-Yu , Su Shou-Yi 

TITLE=What’s Cooking? – Cognitive Training of Executive Function in the Elderly

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Psychology

VOLUME=2

YEAR=2011

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00228

DOI=10.3389/fpsyg.2011.00228

ISSN=1664-1078

ABSTRACT=<p>Executive function involves the efficient and adaptive engagement of the control processes of updating, shifting, and inhibition (Miyake, <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B37">2000</xref>) to guide behavior toward a goal. It is associated with decrements in many other cognitive functions due to aging (West, <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B54">1996</xref>; Raz, <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B40">2000</xref>) with itself particularly vulnerable to the effect of aging (Treitz et al., <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B50">2007</xref>). Cognitive training in the form of structural experience with executive coordination demands exhibited effective enhancement in the elderly (Hertzog et al., <xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B23">2008</xref>). The current study was thus aimed at the development and evaluation of a training regime for executive function in the elderly. The breakfast cooking task of Craik and Bialystok (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B14">2006</xref>) was adapted into a multitasking training task in a session (pre-test vs. post-test) by group (control vs. training). In the training condition, participants constantly switched, updated, and planned in order to control the cooking of several foods and concurrently performed a table setting secondary task. Training gains were exhibited on task related measures. Transfer effect was selectively observed on the letter–number sequencing and digit symbol coding test. The cooking training produced short term increase in the efficiency of executive control processing. These effects were interpreted in terms of the process overlap between the training and the transfer tasks.</p>