Monday, December 31, 2007

BPR3 - Blogging about Peer-Reviewed Research Reporting

Blogging on Peer-Reviewed ResearchI just stumbled across BPR3 (Bloggers for Peer-Reviewed Research Reporting). GREAT idea. As readers of my blog know, the majority of my posts deal with comments about published journal articles.

Count me in. I'm going to try to get into the habit of using the BPR3 icon in such posts...hopefully their system will do what it says it will.

Kudos to the BPR3 concept.

Saturday, December 29, 2007

Mental timing and dyslexia - another study


Another article (Jamkowski & Rusiak, 2008; Psychological Research journal) investigating the role of temporal processing in reading and reading disabilities (click here for prior related posts). The literature review (intro) is worth a read just to get a quick overview of the potential role of temporal processing in a number of clinical disorders and human cognitive functioning.



Abstract
(italics added by the Time Doc blog dictator)
  • Hari et al. (Brain 174:1373–1380, 2001) demonstrated that dyslexics showed a sluggish attention capture in both visual hemiWelds. Additionally, they indicated a left–right asymmetry in the perception of temporal order of two visual stimuli (they performed worse than controls only if the stimulus in the left hemiWeld preceded that in right hemiWeld). They suggested that a left-sided minineglect is associated with dyslexia. We hypothesized that if a kind of neglect syndrome is responsible for the asymmetry they found, dyslexics should not only show a left–right asymmetry in temporal order judgment of two laterally presented stimuli but also perform equally well as controls when the stimuli are vertically aligned. Our results indicated that in both tasks dyslexics performed generally worse than normal readers. The results suggest that dyslexics suffer from a more general problem of order discrimination.

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Wednesday, December 19, 2007

The important brain clock strikes again: RAS training and Parkinsons

I recently made a post about the impact or RAS (Rhtymic Auditory Stimulaltion) on improved gait (check out this link for a great animation of walking gait) performance in patients with CP. Someone just sent me a link to a boat-load of similar article abstracts, most dealing with the positive benefits of RAS with individuals with Parkinson's disease. The references and abstracts can be found by clicking here.

As I've blogged before, there is a considerable body of evidence linking temporal processing (mediated by the internal brain clock) and Parkinson's disease. RAS is clearly dealing with underlying temporal processing/brain clock mechanisms.

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Improved brain clock improves student performance: Media coverage

Today's edition of the Daytona Beach News-Journal includes an interesting report on a private schools use of a synchronized metronome tapping (SMT) intervention (viz., Interactive Metronome) with elementary school-age children. The article speaks for itself, with the staff reporting positive improvement in behavior and academics for students using the IM method.

As you will notice, myself, and my friend/colleague (Dr. Gordon Taub) were interviewed for the article. We were interviewed as the reporter read our recent journal publication in Psychology in the Schools, an article that reported positive reading improvement after the IM intervention.

This is one of my handful of experiences in being interviewed by a reporter. After spending at least one hour on the phone with the reporter, and sharing all kinds of information, it is interesting to see what comments I (we) made the survived the final cut. I'm pleased that the information attributed to Dr. Taub and I was accurate.

Be sure to watch the video that accompanies the article...it will give you a good feel for the basics of the IM (SMT-based) intervention.

As I've reported before, my involvement in the IM study with Dr. Taub was the impetus for my recent interest in temporal processing, mental/interval time-keeping, and the concept of an internal brain clock. It is why I started the IQ Brain Clock blog.

[See conflict of interest disclosure statement re: my role as a Scientific Advisor to IM]

Just in case this on-line article is ever pulled from the net, I've made a pdf copy available for viewing.


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Monday, December 17, 2007

Can brain games prevent Alzheimer's?

The GNIF Brain Blogger has made an interesting pro/con post on the potential benefits of the brain fitness "brain game" (neurotechnology) market.

If readers want more information, I recommending visiting what I think is the best web resource on the whole brain game/fitness market/research. Check out one of my favorite blogs at Sharp Brains.


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Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Brain clock misc.--nice overview of select concepts

  • Temporal processing
  • Frontal-striatal circuits
  • Scalar Timing Theory
  • Internal Pacemaker.
  • Interval timing and Parkinson's Disease
  • Dopamine
What do these terms have in common? They have all been mentioned, at one time or another, in my blog posts and brain clock related presentations for being involved and/or related to the idea of a central temporal processing internal brain clock (check out term index for this blog for these terms and links to prior posts). Also, they are all mentioned in a very nice literature review in an article dealing with mental timing and Parkinson's Disease. Although the guts of the article was not that important to my current activities, I found the introduction to this article to be a very nice overview of some of the central constructs/concepts in the brain clock literature. Readers might want to check out this article for the same reason. Those with a specific interest in Parkinson's and temporal processing may find the entire article of great interest. The article is by Smith et al. (2007) and was in a recent issue of Brain and Cognition.



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Controlled attention, working memory and brain clock

Central to my thinking regarding the temporal brain clock is the notion of working memory. A number of models of working memory have been proposed, with the first and most prominent being the working memory (WM) model of Baddeley and Hitch (1974).

Myself....I've been very interested in the controlled executive attention (CEA) model of WM of Engle, Kane, and Conway. For readers who have kept up with this blog, and/or those who have heard me present on the IQ Brain Clock (see on-line viewable PPT slide section of this blog page), it is clear that I believe that there is a strong link between the brain clock's temporal processor and the construct of working memory....esp. the shared link in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the central role that CEA plays in the brain clock, working memory, and temporal processing based timing interventions.

Today I skimmed a very nice and concise explanation/definition of the CEA model of WM. The following was in the introduction of an article by Colflesh and Conway (2007) Psychonomic Bulletin and Review:

  • According to the CEA model of WM "there is a domain-general component of WM responsible for guiding attention as well as domain-specific components responsible for maintenance of task-relevant information. Individuals who score high on tests of working memory capacity (WMC) therefore may do so because of greater controlled attention and/or because of better use of domain-specific skills and strategies to aid maintenance. Engle and colleagues have argued that the domain-general controlled attention ability is related to both higher-level cognition, such as fluid intelligence, reading comprehension, and problem solving, and lower level cognition, such as performance of simple visual and auditory attention tasks that require cognitive control."



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Tuesday, November 27, 2007

Mental timing and dyslexia


Yet another research study suggestive of a link between mental/temporal timing/processing and dyslexia. This time fMRI evidence that suggests changes in brain function due to a timing-based letter-sound program. Check it out. Click here for other dyslexia related posts at this blog and here for posts at my sister blog---IQ's Corner.


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Monday, November 26, 2007

XMAS shopping - Serotonin t-shirts


Thanks to Mind Hacks for the tip re: the YAY Serotonin t-shirts that are now available for purchase. Just in time for my holiday shopping

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Wednesday, November 21, 2007

More on brain training for the eldery

Sharp Brains has a more detailed post regarding the topic I blogged about yesterday....new research demonstrating positive effects for brain training in the elderly. Check out SB's post....I consider SB to be the "Ralph Nader" or "Consumer Reports" regarding the growing brain fitness industry.

Tuesday, November 20, 2007

Brain training for elderly - one hour a day?

NPR has a report of a recent study that suggests that one hour a day of intensive brain exercise can improve thinking and memory. Thus study used the Posit Science Brain Fitness Program. The sample size looks to be quite decent (n=400). Caveat...the study was funded by the developers of Posit Science. That aside, I'd like to review the empirical research report when it is published.


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Friday, November 16, 2007

The brain clock temporal resolution (g) power hypothesis--more evidence


[Double click on image to enlarge]

My first post to the IQ Brain Clock was re: an article published in the journal Intelligence that suggested the human brain may have an underlying domain-general brain clock. I was very excited about the possibility of a "temporal g" (general intelligence) brain mechanism, a mechanism that may explain a diverse array of research findings regarding the importance of temporal processing and human performance in many domains. This first article (by Rammsayer and Brandler, 2007), in large part, was the impetus for me starting this humble specialized blog.

I am excited to report that Rammsayer and colleagues have followed up this original study with one based on a larger sample (including the sample in the 2007 publication). The new, and IMHO very important, article is:
  • Helmbold, N., Troche, S. & Rammsayer, T. (2007). Processing of temporal and nontemporal information as predictors of psychometric intelligence: A structural-equation-modeling approach. Journal of Personality, 75 (5), 985-1006. (click here to view)
Abstract
  • Recent research suggests a functional link between temporal acuity and general intelligence. To better understand this relation, the present study took advantage of a large sample (N5260) and structural equation modelling to examine relations among temporal acuity, measured by various tasks, speed of information processing as measured by the Hick reaction time task, and psychometric intelligence. Temporal acuity and the Hick task showed common variance in predicting psychometric intelligence. Furthermore, timing performance was a better predictor of psychometric intelligence and mediated the relation between Hick task performance and psychometric intelligence. These findings are consistent with the idea that temporal acuity reflects a basic property of neural functioning that is relevant to intelligence-related aspects of mental activity including speed of information processing.
A few comments (some exact quotes..others paraphrased and edited) from the article (with emphasis by the blogmaster):

  • There is a large literature demonstraing a relation between higher mental ability and faster speed and of efficiency of processing on simple sensory, memory,and decision tasks. The most frequently used elementary cognitive tasks (ECTs) in this field include inspection time, simple and choice reaction time following the rationale of Hick (1952).
  • Current explanations for the observed relationship between psychometric intelligence and measures obtained from ECT's usually refer to the concept of "neural efficiency" as being responsible for faster and less error-prone information processing in individuals with high mental abilities.
  • The authors base their research on the Temporal Resolution Power Hypothesis (TRPH) which, in essence, is based on the idea that temporal accuracy as assessed by psychophysical timing tasks--in analogy to on ECT's---might reflect basic processes related to neural efficiency. A theoretical context for this notion is affored by the master clock hypothesis....where the oscillation rate of a general clock mechanism in the human central nervous system (CNS) is responsible for the coordination of a wide range of mental activities. According to this view a high temporal resolution power or a high oscillation rate of a general timing mechanism should influence information processing by leading to shorter task completion times and less interference from distracting sources of information.
  • According to the TRPH...finer temporal resolution would be associated with better abilities in both speeded and unspeeded mental ability tests....this, in turn, is a fundamental contributor to psychometric intelligence.
  • These results from this new study are consistent with the idea that temporal acuity is the more important variable in relation to psychometric intelligence and indeed appears to be sufficient to account for the well-replicated effects linking speed of information processing to the general Intelligence-related abilities of the individual.
  • The results presented provide a strong case for the idea that temporal abilities, relative to mere mental speed, are a more important predictor of performance on general intelligence tests
A few final comments. First, the importance of these findings, IMHO, can't be overstated. The reaction time g research is based on a massive literature base and is the dominant theoretical explanation of a possible neural basis for general intelligence (g). The fact that two studies now suggest the temporal g may be more explanatory than reaction time g is a huge deal! Conversely, the presence of only two research studies argues for caution in making too much of these findings. However, as I've written elsewhere, there is a large body of research across disciplines that continues to point to the importance of temporal processing and the possibility of an internal brain clock. Check out the IQ Brain Clock EWOK for a sample of this body of literature.


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Friday, November 02, 2007

Rhythm training may improve gait in cerebral palsy

Another article suggesting a link between interventions that improve mental timing (the brain clock) and rhythmicity (check out "rhythm perception and production" branch at IQ Brain Clock temporal processing EWOK) and important human outcomes---this time, improved gait performance in children with spastic CP. Although different, the essence of the RAS (Rhythmic Auditory Stimulation) training seems to overlap with the essence of syncrhonized metronome tapping (which I have written about, primary in the context of the Interactive Metronome product).

Kwak, E. (2007). Effect of Rhythmic Auditory Stimulation on Gait Performance in Children with Spastic Cerebral Palsy. Journal of Music Therapy, XLIV (3), 2007,198-216.

Abstract
  • The purpose of this study was to use Rhythmic Auditory Stimulation (RAS) for children with spastic cerebral palsy (CP) in a clinical setting in order to determine its effectiveness in gait training for ambulation. RAS has been shown to improve gait performance in patients with significant gait deficits. All 25 participants (6 to 20 years old) had spastic CP and were ambulatory, but needed to stabilize and gain more coordinated movement. Participants were placed in three groups: the control group, the therapist-guided training (TGT) group, and the self-guided training (SGT) group. The TGT group showed a statistically significant difference in stride length, velocity, and symmetry. The analysis of the results in SGT group suggests that the self-guided training might not be as effective as therapist-guided depending on motivation level. The results of this study support three conclusions: (a) RAS does influence gait performance of people with CP; (b) individual characteristics, such as cognitive functioning, support of parents, and physical ability play an important role in designing a training application, the effectiveness of RAS, and expected benefits from the training; and (c) velocity and stride length can be improved by enhancing balance, trajectory, and kinematic stability without increasing cadence.

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Wednesday, October 24, 2007

The brain clock in children: How early?

Again, more from my reading of Meck's edited text on the brain clock and interval timing. This time from Sylvie Droit-Volet's chapter on "Temporal experience and timing in children." Dr. Droit-Volet has published extensively on the developmental aspects of the brain clock in children. [I've got at least a half dozen of her articles in my "to read" folder....I just don't have enough time]

Below are some select quotes/conclusions. The bottom line (from my reading) is that the human temporal processing unit (aka. the brain block) is present in young children and research suggests it functions, in most respects, similar to the adult brain clock. One similarity is that auditory information appears to be processed more efficiently by the human brain clock. Also, attention is a critical ability in temporal processing. Below are some tidbits from the chapter (emphasis added by the Time Doc blogmaster).
  • These findings suggest that the clock-based system underlying time perception in animals and human adults is functional at an early age.
  • There is ample evidence that auditory stimuli are judged longer than equivalent visual stimuli, and visual stimuli shorter than auditory ones....Thus, for the same the same objective duration, more pulses are accumulated for auditory signals than for visual signals, and the subjective time seems longer.
  • However, it has been argued that differences in pacemaker speed are not the main source of variability in a timing system...In fact, according to scalar timing theory, the main source of variance is in the memory-encoding process.

  • The greater sensitivity to duration for auditory than for visual stimuli in younger children suggests a sort of primacy of audition over vision in the processing off temporal information. This is an old idea, already put forward by studies in infants perception of temporal characteristics of speech sound and rhythms.
  • The most critical process in children's abilities to time events is probably the encoding of duration.
  • Difficulties in the encoding of duration can also account for the high variability in the memory representation of the standard duration in young children. Indeed, the memory representation is the result of how it has been encoded. Among the cognitive processes involved in the encoding of duration, we have specifically investigated the of attention. 202
  • Psychologists agree that the amount of attentional resources increases with age durring early development.

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Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Top 50 brain teasers from Sharp Brains


The Sharp Brains blog, for which I provide automatic topic feeds (to this blog--check out right hand side of this blog page), has another specific post worth mentioning.

Check out their Top 50 Brain Teasers and Games for Adults (with a neuroscience angle).

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Time Doc Byte # 4 - Brain clock and attention


Bingo! As I've hypothesized in my ramblings and recent presentations, attention (more specifically, what I believe to be executive controlled attention) is viewed as crucial to an efficient internal brain clock.

Again, quoting from from Meck (2003); Introduction to edited book - Functional and Neural Mechanisms of Interval Timing). [Underline or italic emphasis added by blogmaster.]

  • A number of researchers have presented psychophysical data suggesting that duration judgments depend on the amount of attentional resources allocated to a temporal processor or internal clock.
  • These data provide strong and convincing evidence for the role of attentional time-sharing in interval timing.

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Time Doc Byte # 3 - Brain clock importance and clinical groups


Here is my third Time Doc Byte. Categories - "importance" of the human brain clock and mental time-keeping; relevance to clinical groups/populations

This time the quotes come from a chapter from Meck (2003); Introduction to edited book - Functional and Neural Mechanisms of Interval Timing - yep, I've got the book and am hoping I can get through the technical and deep material - the book is listed as a "recommended book" on the right side of this blog).

Underline or italic emphasis added by blogmaster.

  • The term interval timing is used to describe the temporal discrimination processes involved in the estimation and reproduction of relatively short during the seconds-to-minutes range that form the fabric of our everyday existence and unite our mental representations of actions and rhythmical structures.
  • Human learning and memory is highly sensitive to temporal factors, and oscillator-based models have been proposed for the coding of serial order in memory...In addition, deficits in learning, memory, set shifting, and interval timing have been observed in a variety of patient populations with damage to the basal ganglia, including Parkinson's disease and Huntington's disease patients, as well as other cortical and subcortical brain structures affected by Alzheimer's disease, injury, and stroke.
  • ...understanding temporal integration by the brain will be among the premier topics to unite systems, cellular, computational, and cognitive neuroscience over the next decade.
  • It is interesting to note that some researchers have argued that a primary function of the internal clock is to allow for the efficient transfer of information from one stage of information processing to another at regularly spaced intervals.

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Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Metronome training improves reading achievement

I previously blogged (a self-serving plug) about an "in press" research article that demonstrated that a mental-timing based intervention (Interactive Metronome; IM) improved reading achievement in elementary school children. The research summarized in this article suggests that a brain-based intervention may improve the resolution of a school child's internal brain clock and, in turn, produce positive reading achievement outcomes. [Check out my prior post for a necessary conflict of interest disclosure.] Also...click here for additional IM-related posts (@ the IQ Brain Clock) and mental time-keeping posts at my sister blog (IQ's Corner).

Below is the reference citation (with link to pdf copy of the article) and abstract.

This is exciting stuff. If the reader wants additional information regarding possible reasons for the success of this intervention, check out the Time Doc's recent IM Keynote PowerPoint presentation.

In addition, I've added this article to the "key research articles" section of this blog.

  • Taub, G., McGrew, K. & Keith, T. (2007). Improvements in interval time tracking and effects on reading achievement, Psychology in the Schools, 44 (8), 849-863. (click here to view)
  • This study examined the effect of improvements in timing/rhythmicity on students’ reading achievement. 86 participants completed pre- and post-test measures of reading achievement (i.e., Woodcock-Johnson III, Comprehensive Test of Phonological Processing, Test of Word Reading Efficiency, and Test of Silent Word Reading Fluency). Students in the experimental group completed a 4-week intervention designed to improve their timing/rhythmicity by reducing the latency in their response to a synchronized metronome beat, referred to as a synchronized metronome tapping (SMT) intervention. The results from this non-academic intervention indicate the experimental group’s post-test scores on select measures of reading were significantly higher than the non-treatment control group’s scores at the end of 4 weeks. This paper provides a brief overview of domain-general cognitive abilities believed effected by SMT interventions and provides a preliminary hypothesis to explain how this non-academic intervention can demonstrate a statistically significant effect on students’ reading achievement scores.

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Saturday, October 06, 2007

Geekipedia @ Wired Magazine


[Double click on image to enlarge]

I'm just returning from a trip to Calgary, Canada. Prior to jumping on the plane I picked up a copy of Wired Magazine. I found a very cool extractable insert called Geekipedia. I must be a "geek" as I enjoyed reading the alphabetically listed definitions and explanations of important people, places, ideas and trends, primarily related to the internet and technology. I'm going to add this to my RSS feeds to keep up on new additions.

I particularly liked the visual-graphic for "neurologism"


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Monday, October 01, 2007

Brain augmentation technology

Thanks to the Frontal Cortex for the FYI post regarding comments (at the MIT Tech Review site) by neuroscientist Ed Boyden addressing issues surrounding the use of technology to augment human abilities.


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Brain Blogging carnival #18 available


The 18th edition of the Brain Blogging brain carnival is now available.

Time Doc Byte #2: Importance of the brain clock

Here is my second Time Doc Byte. Category - "importance" of the human brain clock and mental time-keeping. This time quotes from Lewis and Walsh (2005; see "Components of the brain's clock" in the Key Research Articles section.) Emphasis added by the Time Doc blogmaster.

Clearly Dr. Lewis et al believe that some kind of internal brain clock exists, but our understanding how it works, the brain mechanisms involved, etc., is still in a stage of formative development.
  • We know the human brain contains some kind of clock, but determining its neural underpinnings and teasing apart its components have proven difficult.
  • The holy grail of timing research is to understand the ‘time-dependent process’: a mechanism equivalent to a piezoelectric crystal in a man-made clock or the movement of a shadow on a sundial. This has proven an elusive goal, to the extent that ideas about how this mechanism might work remain near the level of conjecture. Researchers have had great difficulty in pinning timing-related activity in the brain to any specific type of function. This is largely because most time measurement tasks draw upon more than one process, making it difficult to tease the various components apart.

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Time Doc Byte # 1: Historical mental timing note

In preparation for my keynote presentation at this last weekends Interactive Metronome conference, I found myself rereading many of the key mental timing articles that I've recommended for reading (see "Key Research Articles" section of this blog for some of these articles). In the process, I realized a personal need to revisit some of the basic information, facts, concepts, etc. in these articles, some of which have been mentioned in posts at this humble blog. As I do this I plan to share some of these key bits of information and/or my musings in some brief posts. This is the first "Time Doc Byte" --- it is a brief historical note.

The recognition that temporal processing is an important dimension of behavior is not new. In his chapter “The Problem of Serial Order in Behavior,” Karl Lashley (1951) was among the first neurophysiologists to broach the issue of temporal processing. Lashley stated (emphasis added by the Time Doc blogmaster:
  • Temporal integration is not found exclusively in language; the coordination of leg movements in insects, the song of birds, the control of trotting and pacing in a gaited horse, the rat running the maze, the architect designing a house, and the carpenter sawing a board present a problem of sequences of action which cannot be explained in terms of succession of external stimuli.

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Wednesday, September 19, 2007

Random tidbits from the mind blogosphere 9-19-07

  • Thanks to Happy Neuron for the FYI re: an article in the International Journal of Neuroscience on the effects on mobile phone use on the brain.
  • The LD blog has more on the Dore cerebellum-based treatment program (click here for prior background posts)
  • Thanks to Mind Hacks for the link to an annotated guide to widely praised books on the brain.
  • Positive Technology Journal has an interesting post on the use of virtual reality technology to help MS patients improve their walking skills.

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Monday, September 17, 2007

Monday, September 03, 2007

Second Chance to Live Blog

I received a personal email from Craig J. Phillips, a person with a personal TBI story. He shares his experiences and thoughts at his blog---Second Chance to Live. Check it out.

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Sunday, August 26, 2007

Refocus on Sharp Brains

Although I provide an online feed of all Sharp Brain blog posts at this blog (as well as IQ's Corner), which allows readers to monitor this important brain fitness blog every time they check my blogs, I thought I'd remind readers of the importance of this blog via this reminder post.

Sharp Brains recently had a nice post (Feed your brain with fun neuroscience) where they summarize their favorite top-10 quotes from their Neuroscience Interview Series. Check it out....and remember to keep an eye on the topic feed I provide to their site.

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Thursday, August 02, 2007

Encephalon brain carnival #28 is up

Vacation - why I've been neglecting my blogs


I should have made this post a few weeks ago.

Regular readers will have noted that I have been MIA from blog posting. Why? Well......I've been busy the past month (and esp. the past two weeks) helping my lovely fiance pack and move out of her house of twenty years, finally get my house sold (just yesterday), and deal with CONSTANT decisions/frustrations/stress that comes with building a new house the Diane and I will move into next Tuesday. On top of that my father and his lovely wife moved to this area and I've needed to help him with some computer set-up issues. Finally, there has been the small matter of planning a "small" wedding on August 18.

With all that has been going on I've found zero time for my hobby....posting to my two blogs. I simply should have notified all readers that I was on vacation....but it really is not a vacation.....I'm physically and mentally drained.

Regardless, I hope to return to nurturing my two blogs sometime soon. I may make some easy FYI posts....but don't expect any creative new stuff (unless some of IQs Corners Virtual Community of Guest Scholars provide some material).

When I shall return to regular posting is not yet known. I'm living the "one day at a time" mantra at this point in time.

Rest assured...once settled into my lovely new house and life I will be back as a regular blogmaster.

Thanks

Thursday, July 12, 2007

Stroke patients and metronome training

I just ran across an article (actually based on an email tip via the mental timing grapevine) for a 2002 article by Thaut et al. in Neuropsychologia that supports the use of synchronized metronome tapping (SMT) methods to improve motor coordination in patients with strokes.

In the article, the authors goal was to "investigate the effect of rhythm on the control of paretic arm movements in stroke patients." The basis for this intervention was prior research that had suggested that:
  • "a rhythmic model of rehabilitative motor training, has shown significant improvements in gait function of stroke patients. In this model, rhythm functions as a sensory cue to induce temporal stability and enhance the temporal organization of motor control in the nervous system by translating the temporal structure of movement patterns into temporally isomorphic auditory rhythmic patterns to entrain the movement in question. Similar models have been successfully used in high-performance motor skill learning in sports and music."
In a sample of 21 hemispheric stroke patients, the researchers found that:
  • "the observed changes in timing and trajectory control strongly suggest that the structured time information in auditory rhythm added significant kinematic stability to the patient’s paretic arm reaching motions. These changes were not present during the non-rhythmic condition...Our data suggest, therefore, that auditory rhythm may offer an essential component of enhanced sensorimotor control to make hemiparetic arm training more effective."
The results of this study provide indirect support for the use of the Interactive Metronome SMT-based program in stroke patients with motor control impairment. (click here for other IM-related prior posts on this blog). Of course, all of this makes sense in the context of the extant research literature on temporal processing and the IQ Brain Clock (click here to enter the wonderful world of the IQ Brain Clock EWOK)



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