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Dietary Lutein and Cognitive Function in Adults: A Meta-Analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials.
Li, J, Abdel-Aal, EM
Molecules (Basel, Switzerland). 2021;(19)
Abstract
Emerging literature suggests that dietary lutein may have important functions in cognitive health, but there is not enough data to substantiate its effects in human cognition. The current study was intended to determine the overall effect of lutein on the main domains of cognition in the adult population based on available placebo randomized-controlled trials. Literature searches were conducted in PubMed, AGRICOLA, Scopus, MEDLINE, and EMBASE on 14 November 2020. The effect of lutein on complex attention, executive function and memory domains of cognition were assessed by using an inverse-variance meta-analysis of standardized mean differences (SMD) (Hedge's g method). Dietary lutein was associated with slight improvements in cognitive performance in complex attention (SMD 0.02, 95% CI -0.27 to 0.31), executive function (SMD 0.13, 95% CI -0.26 to 0.51) and memory (SMD 0.03, 95% CI -0.26 to 0.32), but its effect was not significant. Change-from-baseline analysis revealed that lutein consumption could have a role in maintaining cognitive performance in memory and executive function. Although dietary lutein did not significantly improve cognitive performance, the evidence across multiple studies suggests that lutein may nonetheless prevent cognitive decline, especially executive function. More intervention studies are needed to validate the role of lutein in preventing cognitive decline and in promoting brain health.
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Early Caregiver-Child Interaction and Children's Development: Lessons from the St. Petersburg-USA Orphanage Intervention Research Project.
McCall, RB, Groark, CJ, Hawk, BN, Julian, MM, Merz, EC, Rosas, JM, Muhamedrahimov, RJ, Palmov, OI, Nikiforova, NV
Clinical child and family psychology review. 2019;(2):208-224
Abstract
We review a series of interrelated studies on the development of children residing in institutions (i.e., orphanages) in the Russian Federation or placed with families in the USA and the Russian Federation. These studies rely on a single population, and many potential parameters that typically vary in the literature are similar across studies. The conceptual focus is on the role of early caregiver-child interactions and environmental factors that influence those interactions in children's development. Generally, children residing in institutions that provided minimal caregiver-child interactions displayed delayed physical, cognitive, and social-emotional development. Children and adolescents adopted from such institutions at 18 months of age or older had higher rates of behavioral and executive function problems, even many years after adoption. An intervention that improved the institutional environment by increasing the quality of caregiver-child interactions-without changes in nutrition, medical care, sanitation, and safety-led to substantial increases in the physical, cognitive, and social-emotional development of resident children with and without disabilities. Follow-up studies of children in this intervention who were subsequently placed with USA and Russian families revealed some longer-term benefits of the intervention. Implications are discussed for theoretical understanding of the role of early caregiver-child interactions in development as well as for practice and policy.
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Harnessing centred identity transformation to reduce executive function burden for maintenance of health behaviour change: the Maintain IT model.
Caldwell, AE, Masters, KS, Peters, JC, Bryan, AD, Grigsby, J, Hooker, SA, Wyatt, HR, Hill, JO
Health psychology review. 2018;(3):231-253
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Abstract
The inability to produce sustainable lifestyle modifications (e.g., physical activity, healthy diet) remains a major barrier to reducing morbidity and mortality from prevalent, preventable conditions. The objective of this paper is to present a model that builds on and extends foundational theory and research to suggest novel approaches that may help to produce lasting behaviour change. The model aims to integrate factors not typically examined together in order to elucidate potential processes underlying a shift from behaviour initiation to long-term maintenance. The central premise of the Maintain IT model builds on approaches demonstrating that in-tact executive function (EF) is critical for health behaviour initiation, for more complex behaviours beyond initiation, and in unsupportive environments and circumstances, but successful recruitment of EF is effortful and prone to error. Enduring changes are more likely if the underlying cognitive processes can become less effortful (non-conscious, automatic). The Maintain IT model posits that a centred identity transformation is one path leading to less effortful processing and facilitating successful recruitment of EF when necessary over the long term, increasing the sustainability of health behaviour change. A conceptual overview of the literature supporting the utility of this integrative model, future directions, and anticipated challenges are presented.
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The Impact of Epicatechin on Human Cognition: The Role of Cerebral Blood Flow.
Haskell-Ramsay, CF, Schmitt, J, Actis-Goretta, L
Nutrients. 2018;(8)
Abstract
Epicatechin is a monomeric flavanol found in food sources such as tea, apples, berries and cocoa. A number of large-scale epidemiological studies have demonstrated an association between the consumption of these foods and cognitive function, as well as improved blood flow. The aim of this review is to summarise the evidence from intervention studies to clarify the effect of epicatechin on cognition and to consider the role of increased cerebral blood flow as a mechanism for any effects. The effects of epicatechin as consumed in cocoa are, therefore, reviewed here as this represents the only dietary source where it is purported to be the major active component. Our main findings are that a) the positive modulation of tasks that involve memory, executive function and processing speed in older adults; b) the cognitive benefits are more often shown in studies containing more than 50 mg epicatechin/day; and c) all studies with a duration of 28 days or longer in populations >50 years old demonstrate a cognitive improvement. However, as highlighted by this review, it is not currently possible to attribute effects solely to epicatechin without consideration of synergies. In order to overcome this issue, further studies examining the cognitive effects of epicatechin in isolation are required. The role of cerebral blood flow also requires further investigation through simultaneous measurement alongside cognitive function.
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Early-Life Adversity and Physical and Emotional Health Across the Lifespan: A Neuroimmune Network Hypothesis.
Nusslock, R, Miller, GE
Biological psychiatry. 2016;(1):23-32
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Abstract
Children who experience chronic stressors are vulnerable to emotional and physical health problems across the lifespan. This phenomenon raises questions for scientists and clinicians alike. How does adversity get under the skin of the developing child? Through what mechanisms does it confer vulnerability to a heterogeneous set of mental and physical illnesses? And how does it instantiate risk across different life stages, engendering vulnerability to conditions that develop shortly after stressor exposure-like depression-and conditions that manifest decades later, like heart disease? Although answers to these questions have started to emerge, research has typically focused on single diseases or organ systems. To understand the plethora of health problems associated with childhood adversity, we argue that the field needs a second generation of research that recognizes multidirectional transactions among biological systems. To help facilitate this process, we propose a neuroimmune network hypothesis as a heuristic framework for organizing knowledge from disparate literatures and as a springboard for generating integrative research. Drawing on existing data, we argue that early-life adversity amplifies crosstalk between peripheral inflammation and neural circuitries subserving threat-related, reward-related, and executive control-related processes. This crosstalk results in chronic low-grade inflammation, thereby contributing to adiposity, insulin resistance, and other predisease states. In the brain, inflammatory mediators act on cortico-amygdala threat and cortico-basal ganglia reward, circuitries in a manner that predisposes individuals to self-medicating behaviors like smoking, drug use, and consumption of high-fat diets. Acting in concert with inflammation, these behaviors accelerate the pathogenesis of emotional and physical health problems.
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Antidepressants and their effect on cognition in major depressive disorder.
Papakostas, GI
The Journal of clinical psychiatry. 2015;(8):e1046
Abstract
Cognitive functioning is a symptom of major depressive disorder (MDD) that deserves particular attention by clinicians and researchers. Despite the fact that cognitive dysfunction represents a symptom of MDD as well as a functional outcome measure, cognition has been insufficiently investigated in antidepressant trials. While, until recently, few placebo-controlled trials have measured cognition in MDD, those examples which did have consisted of older adults. Of agents tested thus far in placebo-controlled trials (citalopram, duloxetine, vortioxetine), only the latter has been studied in patients aged 18-65, and only the latter has been shown to be superior to placebo in improving measures of executive functioning and to do so across adult age groups. Both duloxetine and vortioxetine appear to result in greater improvements than placebo in immediate and delayed memory. Clinicians who wish to improve the psychosocial recovery of patients with MDD should be familiar with studies of new options for treatment.
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[Effects of Aging Brain and Activation Methods of Its Compensatory Resources].
Razumnikova, OM
Uspekhi fiziologicheskikh nauk. 2015;(2):3-16
Abstract
The review contains recently finding mechanisms of aging brain and of age-associated imbalances of architecture and functions of brain neural systems. The compensatory resources of a brain and the methods of its cognitive training influencing the integrity and development of intellectual functions are described. It is shown meaning life style in dynamics of brain aging.
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Meta-analysis of memory and executive dysfunctions in relation to vitamin D.
Annweiler, C, Montero-Odasso, M, Llewellyn, DJ, Richard-Devantoy, S, Duque, G, Beauchet, O
Journal of Alzheimer's disease : JAD. 2013;(1):147-71
Abstract
BACKGROUND Hypovitaminosis D is associated with global cognitive impairment in adults. It remains unclear which domain-specific cognitive functions are affected with hypovitaminosis D. OBJECTIVE To systematically review and quantitatively synthesize the association of serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D (25OHD) concentrations with episodic memory and executive functions in adults. METHODS A Medline and PsycINFO libraries search was conducted on May 2012, with no limit of date, using the Medical Subject Headings (MeSH) terms "Vitamin D" OR "Hydroxycholecalciferols" combined with the MeSH terms "Memory" OR "Memory Disorders" OR "Executive Function" OR "Attention" OR "Cognition" OR "Cognition disorders" OR "Dementia" OR "Alzheimer disease" OR "Neuropsychological Tests". Fixed-effects meta-analysis was performed from 12 eligible studies using an inverse-variance method. RESULTS Of the 285 selected studies, 14 observational studies (including 3 prospective cohort studies) and 3 interventional studies met the selection criteria. All were of good quality. The number of participants ranged from 44-5,692 community-dwellers (0-100% women). In the pooled analysis, although episodic memory disorders showed only modest association with lower 25OHD concentrations (summary effect size of the difference (ES) = -0.09 [95%CI:-0.16;-0.03]), associations of greater magnitude were found with executive dysfunctions (processing speed: mean difference of Trail Making Test (TMT)-A score = 4.0 [95% CI:1.20;6.83]; mental shifting: mean difference of TMT-B score = 12.47 [95% CI:6.78;18.16]; information updating tests: ES = -0.31 [95% CI:-0.5;-0.09]). The pooled risk of incident decline of TMT-B score was OR = 1.25 [95% CI:1.05;1.48] in case of initial lower 25OHD concentrations. Vitamin D repletion resulted in improved executive functions (ES = -0.50 [95% CI:-0.69;-0.32] for before-and-after comparison), but exhibited no difference with control groups (ES = 0.14 [95% CI:-0.04;0.32] for between-group comparison after intervention). CONCLUSION Lower serum 25OHD concentrations predict executive dysfunctions, especially on mental shifting, information updating and processing speed. The association with episodic memory remains uncertain.