Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Test post. Trying out new iPad blogging ap

Testing one, two, three

Posted via DraftCraft app

Questions & Answers: Training of working memory in children with attention deficits

Kathryn Ralph Research Coordinator Cogmed Pearson Clinical Assessment (888) 748-3828 x 115 kathryn.ralph@pearson.com Presented by: Torkel Klingberg, M.D., Ph.D., Karolinska Institute Below please find answers to questions asked during the live webinar: 1. How does someone initiate the Cogmed training? Is it covered by insurance? Cogmed can be found across the world. To find a Cogmed [...]





Sent with MobileRSS HD


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

More on music therapy in rehab@maxachieveinc, 11/30/11 7:15 PM

April Christopherson (@maxachieveinc)
11/30/11 7:15 PM
Music can help retrain the brain - USATODAY.com usat.ly/spPQqH via @USATODAY


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Is it possible to fine-tune the human brain clock?



I just made a guest blog post at the IM-Home blog with the above title. It is the fourth blog in my introductory series that explains why I am so interested in mental timing and brain-clock based neurotechnologies. You can find the new post here.

Generated by: Tag Generator

Fourth Annual Neuroscience Boot Camp@neuroghetto, 11/30/11 5:07 AM

Indie Neuroblogs (@neuroghetto)
11/30/11 5:07 AM
Fourth Annual Neuroscience Boot Camp bit.ly/vF42IU


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

ADHD due to different brain network use?@TheBrainScience, 11/30/11 8:37 AM

Brain Science (@TheBrainScience)
11/30/11 8:37 AM
RSNA: Attention Pathways Altered in ADHD sns.mx/Y7eSy7


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Brain training better than crossword exercises in adults@kengilhooly, 11/30/11 8:42 AM

Ken Gilhooly (@kengilhooly)
11/30/11 8:42 AM
Brain training exercises effective at improving cognitive function in older Ps (50+) medicalxpress.com/news/2011-11-b… >full paper looks pretty solid!


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Does the brain have a central auditory "pitch center"?@TheBrainScience, 11/30/11 8:47 AM

Brain Science (@TheBrainScience)
11/30/11 8:47 AM
Is There a Central Brain Area for Hearing Melodies and Speech Cues? sns.mx/Y7eSy4


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Mental/brain capitalism@AlvaroF, 11/30/11 9:14 AM

Alvaro Fernandez (@AlvaroF)
11/30/11 9:14 AM
Update: Time to become mental capitalists and invest in our brains? #constantcontact conta.cc/tsQM56


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Brain Notes@maxachieveinc, 11/30/11 9:26 AM



Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Research Byte: Drinking to distraction: Booze and attention in adults with ADHD

Citation

Database: PsycARTICLES
[ First Posting ]
Drinking to distraction: Does alcohol increase attentional bias in adults with ADHD?
Roberts, Walter; Fillmore, Mark T.; Milich, Richard
Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology, Nov 28, 2011, No Pagination Specified. doi: 10.1037/a0026379

Abstract

  1. Previous research has shown that social drinkers continue to show attentional bias toward alcohol-related stimuli even after consuming a moderate dose of alcohol. In contrast, little is known about how alcohol acutely affects attentional bias in groups at risk to develop alcohol-related problems, such as adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Such individuals may show increased attentional bias following alcohol relative to nonclinical controls. The present study tested this hypothesis by examining acute alcohol effects on attentional bias in 20 social drinkers with ADHD and 20 social drinkers with no history of ADHD. Participants performed a visual-probe task after receiving the following doses of alcohol: 0.64g/kg, 0.32g/kg, and 0.0g/kg (placebo). Those in the ADHD group showed increased attentional bias under active alcohol doses, whereas attentional bias was similar across doses in the control group. Attentional bias predicted ad libitum alcohol consumption during a taste-rating session. This relation was observed only in the ADHD group. These findings indicate that an acute alcohol dose increases attentional bias in adults with ADHD. Further, attentional bias appears to be a predictor of ad libitum consumption in this group. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)



Research brief: Dyslexia and perceptual speed


Citation

Database: PsycARTICLES
[ Journal Article ]
Visual temporal processing in dyslexia and the magnocellular deficit theory: The need for speed?
McLean, Gregor M. T.; Stuart, Geoffrey W.; Coltheart, Veronika; Castles, Anne
Journal of Experimental Psychology: Human Perception and Performance, Vol 37(6), Dec 2011, 1957-1975. doi:10.1037/a0024668

Abstract

  1. A controversial question in reading research is whether dyslexia is associated with impairments in the magnocellular system and, if so, how these low-level visual impairments might affect reading acquisition. This study used a novel chromatic flicker perception task to specifically explore temporal aspects of magnocellular functioning in 40 children with dyslexia and 42 age-matched controls (aged 7–11). The relationship between magnocellular temporal resolution and higher-level aspects of visual temporal processing including inspection time, single and dual-target (attentional blink) RSVP performance, go/no-go reaction time, and rapid naming was also assessed. The Dyslexia group exhibited significant deficits in magnocellular temporal resolution compared with controls, but the two groups did not differ in parvocellular temporal resolution. Despite the significant group differences, associations between magnocellular temporal resolution and reading ability were relatively weak, and links between low-level temporal resolution and reading ability did not appear specific to the magnocellular system. Factor analyses revealed that a collective Perceptual Speed factor, involving both low-level and higher-level visual temporal processing measures, accounted for unique variance in reading ability independently of phonological processing, rapid naming, and general ability. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)

Research byte: Deficits in attentional control and ADHD implications

Citation

Database: PsycARTICLES
[ Journal Article ]
Deficits in attentional control: Cholinergic mechanisms and circuitry-based treatment approaches.
Sarter, Martin; Paolone, Giovanna
Behavioral Neuroscience, Vol 125(6), Dec 2011, 825-835. doi: 10.1037/a0026227

Abstract

  1. The cognitive control of attention involves maintaining task rules in working memory (or "online"), monitoring reward and error rates, filtering distractors, and suppressing prepotent, and competitive responses. Weak attentional control increases distractibility and causes attentional lapses, impulsivity, and attentional fatigue. Levels of tonic cholinergic activity (changes over tens of seconds or minutes) modulate cortical circuitry as a function of the demands on cognitive control. Increased cholinergic modulation enhances the representation of cues, by augmenting cue-evoked activity in thalamic glutamatergic afferents, thereby increasing the rate of detection. Such cholinergic modulation is mediated primarily via α4β2* nicotinic acetylcholine receptors. Animal experiments and clinical trials in adult patients with ADHD indicate that attentional symptoms and disorders may benefit from drugs that stimulate this receptor. Tonic cholinergic modulation of cue-evoked glutamatergic transients in prefrontal regions is an essential of the brain's executive circuitry. This circuitry model guides the development of treatments of deficits in attentional control. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)component of the brain's executive circuitry. This circuitry model guides the development of treatments of deficits in attentional control. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2011 APA, all rights reserved)



Monday, November 28, 2011

Military brain testing program fails@StanfordCLB, 11/28/11 10:41 PM

Stanford CLB (@StanfordCLB)
11/28/11 10:41 PM
Pro Publica: Testing Program Fails Soldiers, Leaving Brain Injuries Undetected propublica.org/article/testin…


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Brain waves and brain states@BrainCosmos, 11/27/11 12:27 PM

Brain (@BrainCosmos)
11/27/11 12:27 PM
Brainwaves and Mind States bit.ly/tycdkW


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Basal ganglia and ADHD@NeurosciUpdate, 11/27/11 1:27 PM

Interesting  new research (see retweet below) implicating the role of the basal ganglia in ADHD.  The Brain Clock blog master finds this particularly interesting given the prominent role the basal ganglia plays in temporal processing (and the internal brain clock) and how mental timing has been linked to ADHD.

Check out timing related basal ganglia posts at this link.

http://www.brainclock.net/search/label/basal%20ganglia

Check out ADHD timing related posts at this link.

http://www.brainclock.net/search/label/ADHD


Neurosci Update (@NeurosciUpdate)
11/27/11 1:27 PM
Basal Ganglia Studies and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) - Decoded Science bit.ly/rEJQHl


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Mobile Alzheimer’s test developed at Cambridge to be trialled by GPs - Research - University of Cambridge

Story at link below

http://www.cam.ac.uk/research/news/alzheimer%E2%80%99s-test-developed-at-cambridge-to-be-trialled-by-gps/


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Wall brain clock gifts

Just ran across wall "brain clocks" at Cafe Press.

Let the data speak: CHC theory of intelligence tipping point in mainstream intelligence research


From IQs Corner blog.  An indicator that the CHC "tipping point" has moved beyond the applied field of school psychology IQ testing and has occurred in mainstream intelligence research

Intelligent Insights on Intelligence Theories and Tests (aka IQ's Corner)

Intelligent Insights on Intelligence Theories and Tests (aka IQ's Corner)


Let the data speak. McGrew (2009) CHC intelligence article #6 most cited in journal Intelligence

Posted: 26 Nov 2011 05:03 PM PST


I was just doing some fun web browsing at the journal web site for the most prestigious journal in the field of intelligence (Intelligence) and was pleasantly surprised to see that my 2009 invited editorial is currently among the most cited articles in the journal (#6), and was #12 in the most read articles. Damn....this makes my day. Thanks to all who have read and cited it. This will make my mom and dad proud.

CHC theory and the human cognitive abilities project: Standing on the shoulders of the giants of psychometric intelligence research. Intelligence, Volume 37, Issue 1, January 2009, Pages 1-10, McGrew, K.S.

Abstract

During the past decade the Cattell-Horn Gf-Gc and Carroll Three-Stratum models have emerged as the consensus psychometric-based models for understanding the structure of human intelligence. Although the two models differ in a number of ways, the strong correspondence between the two models has resulted in the increased use of a broad umbrella term for a synthesis of the two models (Cattell-Horn-Carroll theory of cognitive abilities-CHC theory). The purpose of this editorial is three-fold. First, I will describe the CHC framework and recommend that intelligence researchers begin using the CHC taxonomy as a common nomenclature for describing research findings and a theoretical framework from which to test hypotheses regarding various aspects of human cognitive abilities. Second, I argue that the emergence of the CHC framework should not be viewed as the capstone to the psychometric era of factor analytic research. Rather, I recommend the CHC framework serve as the stepping stone to reinvigorate the investigation of the structure of human intelligence. Finally, the Woodcock-Muñoz Foundation Human Cognitive Abilities (HCA) project, which is an evolving, free, on-line electronic archive of the majority of datasets analyzed in Carroll's (1993) seminal treatise on factor analysis of human cognitive abilities, is introduced and described. Intelligence scholars are urged to access the Carroll HCA datasets to test and evaluate structural models of human intelligence with contemporary methods (confirmatory factor analysis). In addition, suggestions are offered for linking the analysis of contemporary data sets with the seminal work of Carroll. The emergence of a consensus CHC taxonomy and access to the original datasets analyzed by Carroll provides an unprecedented opportunity to extend and refine our understanding of human intelligence. © 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Saturday, November 26, 2011

Mans interst in human brain clock long standing

Ulrich, Nitchske & Rammsayer (2006) 

Time is an essential component of our mental life. Hence, it is not surprising that for many years, philoso-phers and psychologists have been intrigued by the ques-tion of how time enters into our experiences and thus shapes our cognitions (Roeckelein, 2000). For example, the great philosopher Immanuel Kant (1787/1998) ar-gued that space and time are basic intuitions (“a priori Anschauungen”) that structure our cognition. In addition, he believed that time involves a more subjective intuition than does space (see Boring, 1957). Thus, among other things, the study of time perception derives from Kant' s proposal about time. The perception of time also attracted early psychophysicists (e.g., Mach, 1865; Vierordt, 1868) and has remained an active field of research in psychology up to the present day (see Grondin, 2001; Meck, 2003). More recently, time perception has become a major object of research in the field of the cognitive neurosciences (see Lewis & Miall, 2003; Nobre & O'Reilly, 2004)

Book nook: The Concept of Time in Psychology

New book added to the suggested books blogroll. It is a bit dated in terms of contemporary research but apparently is an excellent historical source for tracing mans interst in time.

Roeckelein, J. E. (2000). The concept of time in psychology: A resource book and annotated bibliography. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Click here and here for more info.

The methodologies used to study psychological time, especially the experimental and empirical approaches, are critically important in the scientific analysis of the concept of time. This resource and annotated bibliography provides a current and comprehensive review of the literature on psychological time, and traces the evolution of the concept of time in psychology from ancient to modern periods. A resource and annotated bibliography which traces the lineage and evolution of the concept of time in psychology from ancient to pre--modern and modern periods with an emphasis on a traditionalist and experimental/empirical approach to the understanding of psychological time. The book describes various physical, philosophical, and psychological theories and definitions of time, and focuses on the methodological concerns of psychologists regarding the scientific investigation of time. In addition to over 1,000 citations and references, this resource contains over 900 current annotated entries. It contains both name and subject indexes and will be of interest to students and faculty in psychology, related fields of study, and academic and selected public libraries

Neurons Are One Of The Building Blocks Of The Nervous System

Did you know that you have over 100 billion neurons in your brain? These neurons are the building blocks of the nervous system and are crucial to processing information in the brain as well as receiving and transmitting information.

<snip>. Rest of story at link below.





Sent with MobileRSS HD


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Friday, November 25, 2011

More on music-cognition link@DericBownds, 11/25/11 8:15 AM

Deric Bownds (@DericBownds)
11/25/11 8:15 AM
Brief musical training enhances other cognitive skills - mindblog.dericbownds.net/2011/11/brief-…


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Working memory, speed and prefrontal cortex@BrainCosmos, 11/25/11 9:05 AM

Brain (@BrainCosmos)
11/25/11 9:05 AM
Capacity-Speed Relationships in Prefrontal Cortex :PLoS ONE, Neuroscience bit.ly/vAMi31


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Monday, November 21, 2011

Brain Beat: The neuroscience of music workshop/institute

http://www.italianacademy.columbia.edu/brainbeat.html


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

The Auditory Neuroscience Lab.

Very interesting lab that is producing large volumes of publications related to music, rhythm and brain timing and rhythm. The Auditory Neuroscience Lab.

BRAMS - International Laboratory for Brain, Music and Sound Research

BRAMS is a unique research centre dedicated to research excellence, located in Montreal and jointly affiliated with the University of Montreal and McGill University. The research centre is devoted to the study of music cognition with a focus on neuroscience. On this introductory page, you will find a quick overview of BRAMS website's various features.

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Book nook: Klingberg's Overflowing Brain

If I were to recommend one book written for the lay person re: the critical importance of attention/focus and working memory to everyday cognition, and the promise of neurotech products to stretch these capacities, I would recommend Klingberg's The Overflowing Brain, SharpBrians 2008 book of the year.

Reviews of the book have generally positive, but there have been some criticisms in some journal reviews (click here for more info at IQs Corner)

Saturday, November 19, 2011

Coffee and cognition@AlvaroF, 11/19/11 12:20 PM

Alvaro Fernandez (@AlvaroF)
11/19/11 12:20 PM
coffee enhances cognition but effects r narrow not durable -why we drink more. Science tinyurl.com/coffeebrain @nhagerwtop @MDLinx @alfrunner


Sent from KMcGrew iPhone (IQMobile). (If message includes an image-double click on it to make larger-if hard to see) 

Neuroscience advances@NIMHgov, 11/19/11 12:34 PM

Mental Health NIMH (@NIMHgov)
11/19/11 12:34 PM
Neuroscience Advances Showcased. New Director's Blog: 1.usa.gov/sqVuiw | #NIMHgov


Sent from KMcGrew iPhone (IQMobile). (If message includes an image-double click on it to make larger-if hard to see) 

Friday, November 18, 2011

Cogmed Informational Webinar – December 7th

©2011 Cogmed Working Memory Training. All Rights Reserved..





Sent with MobileRSS HD


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Torkel Klingberg hosts webinar “Training of Working memory in Children with Attention Deficits”

Posted: November 18th, 2011 - On November 14th, Cognitive Neuroscientist and Cogmed Co-Founder, Dr.Torkel Klingberg, hosted an online presentation titled "Training of Working memory in Children with Attention Deficits".





Sent with MobileRSS HD


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

How would you like 2 Million Sites linking to your ad ?

We have developed a software that automatically
places your ad on millions of blogs.

You will receive thousands of targeted hits to 
your website as Blog Blaster places your ad on 
blogs that match your ad's category. 

This method has never been released to the public 
before. Very few, if anyone has implemented this.

Click here to visit our website

 

 

 

 

 

 

Click here to unsubscribe

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Fast paced TV shows result in poor executive function in preschoolers?@drgitlin, 11/17/11 6:06 PM

Jonathan Gitlin (@drgitlin)
11/17/11 6:06 PM
Does exposure to fast-paced television reduce cognitive function in young children? j.mp/upp9Nx

Maybe we need to bring back Mr. Rogers.


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

How the brain makes memories: Rhythmically

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111003161935.htm


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

Tic toc: Where's your brain's clock?

I stumbled across a nice general media article that highlights some of the major concepts OD the human master brain clock. The article was in the Conversation.

Gabby Giffords response to music therapy: Fine-tunning the brain clock via rhythm


Very interesting story and video regarding speech and language therapy progress for Congresswoman Gabby Giffords.

The use of music therapy is consistent with rhythm-based intervention programs.  One of this class of interventions mentioned in the article is melodic intonation therapy (MIT).  MIT is one of a class of rhythm-based therapies that have demostrated significant progress not only for brain-injury related aphasia, but other clinical disorders.  The Brain Clock blog has made many posts regarding the importance of brain rhythm or timing, with the master internal brain clock possibly being the underlying cognitive/brain mechanism that may be being "fine tuned" by these therapies.



A recent white paper that reviewed the efficacy of 23 different rhythm-based therapies can be found here. I recently blogged about one of these neurotechnologies, namely Interactive Metronome, at the IM-Home web page blog.  My post can be found here.  In a post to be released any day, I touch on the above white paper that concluded:

"After a review of four different types of rhythm-based timing treatments, of which IM was just one, we concluded that:
we believe that collectively the preponderance of positive outcomes (across the 23 listed studies) indicates that rhythm-based mental-timing treatments have merit for clinical use and warrant increased clinical use and research attention…positive treatment outcomes were reported for all four forms of rhythm-based treatment.  Positive outcomes were also observed for normal subjects and, more importantly, across a variety of clinical disorders (e.g., aphasia, apraxia, coordination/movement disorders, TBI, CP, Parkinson's disease, stroke/CVA, Down's syndrome, ADHD)….One notable observation of interest is that 15 of the 23 studies (the RAS, AOS-RRT and SMT treatment studies) all employed some form of auditory-based metronome to pace or cue the subjects targeted rhtymic behavior.  In all other studies, rhythm-pacing used some form of manual tapping or beat sound (e.g., drum).  We conclude that the use of external metronome-based rhythm tools (tapping to a beat, metronome-based rhythmic pacing, rhythmic-cuing via timed pulses/beats) is a central tool to improving temporal processing and mental-timing.” 


Generated by: Tag Generator

Saturday, November 12, 2011

Seeking the Neurobiology of Psychiatric Disorders (News and Features)

Researchers are combining brain imaging, genetics, and molecular and cellular biology to find new ways to understand and treat anxiety disorders and schizophrenia.






Sent with MobileRSS HD


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Computational modeling of prefrontal cortex@BrainCosmos, 11/12/11 5:52 AM

Brain (@BrainCosmos)
11/12/11 5:52 AM
Computational modeling of the dynamical reorganization in the PFC j.mp/skUYP0


Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
Kevin McGrew, PhD
Educational Psychologist

Friday, November 11, 2011

Upcoming: Grand Rounds Blog Carnival and Brain Fitness Q&A

Just a quick note to announce that next Tuesday, November 15th, SharpBrains.com will be hosting two great resources:

1– Grand Rounds Blog Carnival: the weekly collection of what's best in the health and medical blogosphere (see great latest edition Here). If you want to contribute your own blog post, please do so via this Contact Us form.
2– Live Q&A Session with Alvaro Fernandez, coauthor of The SharpBrains Guide to Brain Fitness (recently selected as one of the Best Books on Brain Fitness by AARP). Session will take place at 11am Pacific Time/ 2pm Eastern Time, and will be moderated by Harry Moody, Director of Academic Affairs at AARP. To learn more click Here.

Please make sure to visit us Tuesday!






    Sent with MobileRSS HD


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    The brain clock (mental timing) and clinical disorders

    The human brain clock is intimately involved in wide array of human cognitive and motor behaviors.  At this blog a number of clincal disorders have been associated with some degree of disturbance or damage to brain mechanisms related to mental timing.  This informaiton is scattered across a variety of posts.  I decided to pull it all together (as of today's date) in this post.

    Mental timing (brain clock) has been implicated via research reported at this blog in:

    ADHD and attention

    Autismhttp://www.brainclock.net/search/label/autism

    Various speech and language disorders
    Tourette's syndrome

    Cerbral palsy

    Central auditory processing disorders (CAPD)

    Reading disabilities/dyslexia (click here, here and here)

    Various dopaminegeric-based disorders
    Gate disorders

    Stroke related dysfunction

    A more detailed reference list of timing-related dysfunctions/disorder (e.g., aging related disorders--Alzheimer's, dementia; ADHD, motor coordination/timing disorders--gait, stroke,swallowing;  speech and language disorders--aphasia/stroke/apraxia/speech; TBI) can be found in special white paper regarding the efficacy of various rhythm-based interventions.

    Domain-general v domain-specific mechanisms in intelligence and learning

    I have often referred to the human brain clock as representing a domain-general cognitive mechanism, in contrast to a domain-specific mechanism.  I recently found an excellent article that describes the fundamental difference between "jack-of-all-trade" (domain-general) and compartmentalized or modular (domain-specific) brain-based cognitive mechanisms, placed within the context of evoultionary psychology.  Both classess of mechanisms are important for human cognition and learning.  For those who really want to understand this distinction, I would recommend the 2005 article "The evolution of domain-general mechnaisms in intelligence and learning" (Journal of General Psychology (by Chiappe & McDonald).

    USA TODAY: Brain experts weigh in on Perry's brain freeze incident during GOP debate

    Real world incident that gives some insights into working memory and the frontal lobes


    Check out this article that I saw in USA TODAY's iPad application.

    Brain experts weigh in on Perry's brain freeze incident
    http://usat.ly/tUrTME

    To view the story, click the link or paste it into your browser.

    To learn more about USA TODAY for iPad and download, visit: http://usatoday.com/ipad/


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Thursday, November 10, 2011

    TED Talk looks at the purpose of the brain - Scope - medical blog - Stanford University School of Medicine



    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    PEBS Neuroethics Roundup (JHU)

    Last Edition's Most Popular Article: On the consequences of personhood, Neuroethics at the Core In The Popular Press: Study Finds Signs of Awareness in 3 'Vegetative' Patients, New York Times Discovering Consciousness in the 'Permanently Unconscious': What Should We Do?...





    Sent with MobileRSS HD


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Book nook: review of another ADHD book focused on children

    http://psycnet.apa.org/index.cfm?fa=main.doiLanding&uid=2011-19803-001


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Wednesday, November 09, 2011

    Dr. Susan Gathercole explains working memory

    Susan Gathercole is a cognitive psychologist at the University of York and has been involved with research about memory for over 25 years. ©2011 Cogmed Working Memory Training. All Rights Reserved..





    Sent with MobileRSS HD


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Brain Clock Brain Fitness blogroll updated


    Today the Brain Clock blog updated its blogroll.  It now includes the majority of the major brain fitness/training programs.  Check out the Brain Clock Blogroll

    Tuesday, November 08, 2011

    Blogging status: BlogPress on the fritz and IAP's blogs going pro

    Regular readers may have noticed a significant decrease in blog posts the past few weeks.  Why? 

    I had moved all my blogging to my iPad as I have found it a much more efficient method for posting.  However, a few weeks ago Apple released its new IOS5.0 operating system.  After updating my iPad, my BlogPress app would crash.  I visited the developers web page and they had a note indicating they were aware of the crash and had submitted a fix to Apple for review.  I have been checking daily for the app upate, but it is not showing up.  So, please be patient.  I may go "old school" and do some blogging from my PC.

    Also, I am just starting work with a professional web development company to integrate my IAP web page and professional blogs into a single professional looking (andmore efficient) web portal..  I will be spending significant time working with the developer on this new internet portal and migration of materials to the new server.  I have no idea how long this will take.

    In the end the work will be worth it......so be patient.  I will do what I can to get back "up" and blogging with more regularity.  As soon as BlogPress gets the new app, you should see an uptick in posts. 

    Thanks for your patience

    Neorofeedback aids Parkinson's @TheBrainScience, 11/8/11 4:36 PM

    Brain Science (@TheBrainScience)
    11/8/11 4:36 PM
    Study finds brain retraining can improve Parkinson's symptoms sns.mx/YdeAy0


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    The Brain Clock: Comming out of the neurotech closet



    [Note.  This post was originally written to be distributed to a number of professional listservs.  I then decided against that idea, and instead, produce it here as a blog post.  I will be sending brief FYI (with links to this post) to a number of professional listservs.  So, it sounds like a listserv post...which it originally was...but it is now a blog post.]

    Anyone who has followed my blogs knows that during the past 5 years, aside from my IQ's Corner blog, I have nurtured a sister blog addressing mental timing research (the Brain Clock blog..previously nicknamed the IQ Brain Clock). 

    My interest in the brain clock, and other brain training/fitness technology, piqued as a result of my involvement (very skeptical at first) in a study directed by Gordon Taub in 2004.  Taub, myself, and one of the best stat/methodologists in school psychology (Dr. Tim Keith) published an article in Psychology in the Schools (Taub, McGrew & Keith, 2007) that reported that Interactive Metronome (IM) training resulted in significant increases in the fluency of basic reading skills when compared to control group subjects (randomly assigned treatment and control groups).  The results floored me...as I had become a huge skeptic of non-academic interventions for academics...as I had many scars from the early LD "process remediation" treatment days of Frostig, ITPA psycholinguistic training, Doman-Delacato motor pattern retraining, etc.).  I thus set out on a 5 year mission to explore the brain clock/mental timing research literature, which I have posted portions of at the Brain Clock blog.  I needed to now why such an elegant neurotechnology could have positive impacts on such diverse domains as ADHD, golf, tennis, reading, and stroke rehab.  It had to be working on some kind of cognitive domain-general mechanism.

    I have become convinced that this apparently simple (it is not so simple if you give it a try...it places huge demands on attentional control and executive functions) neurotechnology may be (my working hypotheses) fine tuning the resolution of the underlying human brain clock (or system of clocks), and might be increasing the resolution of neural oscillations as per Jensen's neural efficiency hypothesis.  The brain clock literature has huge overlaps with the contemporary g and executive functions literature, and especially exciting research by Rammsayer et al regarding "temporal g" (which appears more highly correlated with psychometric g than Jensen's reaction time g).  These parallel sets of research all focus on similar neuro constructs and brain networks (the central executive network and the salience/attentional networks...as per recent research on large scale brain networks....the other being the default mode network; see Bressler and Menon, 2010; Large-scale brain networks in cognition: Emerging methods and principles, Trends in Cognitive Science, Vol 14, Issue 6, pp 277-290).

    I won't go into greater detail.  I am going to provide the detail via a series of blog posts at the IM Home web site ---  via the blog feature.  My blog posts will be written for the lay audience, and will contain links back to my Brain Clock blog for the harder science.  My first post is now up and availale (click here)


    CONFLICT OF INTEREST DISCLOSURE - I am not an employee of IM but serve as a paid external consultant.  Also, any statements or positions I make do not reflect the views of the coauthors of the WJ III Battery, a battery of cognitive and achievement tests where I am a co-author.  This disclaimer also applies to Riverside Publishing, the publisher of the WJ III.


    Thank you for reading

    Kevin McGrew
    Educational Psychologist
    Director, Institute for Applied Psychometrics.



    "Is There a Need for Clinical Neuroskepticism?" - Neuroethics & Law Blog



    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Monday, November 07, 2011

    Friday, November 04, 2011

    Thursday, November 03, 2011

    Wednesday, November 02, 2011

    "Cognitive Enhancement, Virtue Ethics and the Good Life"

    Cognitive Enhancement, Virtue Ethics and the Good Life by Barbro Elisabeth Esmeralda Fröding has been published in the most recent issue of Neuroethics: Abstract This article explores the respective roles that medical and technological cognitive enhancements, on the one hand,...





    Sent with MobileRSS HD


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist

    Tuesday, November 01, 2011

    Interactive Metronome: Drug-free ADHD Treatment?


    As discussed in many posts at this blog, I have hypothesized the synchronized metronome training via new neurotechnologies may improve controlled executive attention and working memory.  Here is an n=1 case study. Please see my conflict of interest disclosure statement on the blog sidebar.


    www.imhome.org | IM-Home is used to help children who suffer from ADHD. After using IM-Home, children tend to see grades improve, longer attention span, and increased socialization with their peers. In addition, IM-Home can improve motor coordination, concentration, and timing, which is essential for sports performance.
    Views: 25
    0 ratings
    Time: 03:25 More in Science & Technology





    Sent with MobileRSS HD


    Sent from Kevin McGrew's iPad
    Kevin McGrew, PhD
    Educational Psychologist