What Do People Expect of Cognitive Enhancement?

Perceptions of Brain Training: Public Expectations of Cognitive Benefits From Popular Activities

Many popular activities are thought by the general public to improve cognitive function. Such expectations can influence how often people engage in these activities, as well as the scientific evaluation of their putative cognitive benefits, e.g., via placebo effects. Here, we gathered survey data about the public's perceptions of nine different activities commonly thought to be cognitively stimulating, including "brain-training" games. Information was collected about the degree to which participants thought each activity was beneficial for improving cognitive function and how often they engaged in each activity. The patterns of correlation between ratings reveal details about the perception of cognitive benefits and its relation to engagement. They suggest that participants varied with respect to an overarching perception of the entire set of activities, which were perceived also as divided into three clusters. Frequency of engagement and perceived cognitive benefits were positively correlated across participants for each activity considered individually. But, when the activities were compared, the magnitude of their perceived benefits was not a good predictor of their frequency of engagement (and vice versa). Though small, there were systematic demographic differences. Women were more optimistic than men about cognitive benefits. Individual participants differed in the range of their ratings of benefit across activities, and these ranges were greater for younger than older participants, suggesting that perceptions of benefit are more differentiated among the young. Besides contributing to a better understanding of public expectations of cognitive benefits, the findings of this study are relevant to the critical evaluation of such benefits. Our survey can be viewed as providing an interface between expectations held by the general public and the design of studies examining the efficacy of cognitive training. The type of information it provides could be used in the selection of activities performed by an active control group, so that control activities match the treatment intervention as closely as possible with respect to such expectations.

Is Cognitive Training Worth It? Exploring Individuals' Willingness to Engage in Cognitive Training

We assessed how much time individuals would be willing to spend engaging in game-based cognitive training to gain prolonged functional independence. In Study 1 (N = 294), participants completed a survey with questions assessing how much time they would be willing to invest in daily cognitive training to extend their functional independence by certain amounts of time using a slider response that ranged from 0 to 100 minutes. Participants also completed surveys that measured self-perceived health and cognitive functioning, personality, and other demographic variables. Even for relatively small gains, participants reported being willing to dedicate an average of 11 minutes every day to cognitive training, with some participants willing to engage for significantly longer. The best predictor of willingness to invest time in training was belief in cognitive training efficacy, followed by openness to experience, and participants' self-perceived cognitive deficit. Study 2 examined the same question in a sample of 120 older adults, this time allowing for open-ended responses. Participants reported being willing to invest significantly more time, ranging from more than 40 minutes every day to gain just one week of independence, to over 2.5 hours every day to gain an additional 3 years of independence. Again, perception of cognitive training efficacy was the strongest predictor of willingness to invest time. Results confirm that older adults are willing to invest significant amounts of time to gain independence later in life, and have implications for predicting the adoption of, and adherence to, potentially effective treatments for cognitive decline.

Examining the Interactions Between Expectations and tDCS Effects on Motor and Cognitive Performance

Background: Despite a growing literature and commercial market, the effectiveness of transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) remains questionable. Notably, studies rarely examine factors such as expectations of outcomes, which may influence tDCS response through placebo-like effects. Here we sought to determine whether expectations could influence the behavioral outcomes of a tDCS intervention. Methods: Through an initial study and self-replication, we recruited 121 naïve young adults 18-34 years of age (M = 21.14, SD = 3.58; 88 women). We evaluated expectations of tDCS and of motor and cognitive performance at three times: (i) at baseline; (ii) after being primed to have High or Low expectations of outcomes; and (iii) after a single session of sham-controlled anodal tDCS over the left or right motor cortex. Before and after stimulation, participants performed the Grooved Pegboard Test and a choice reaction time task as measures of motor dexterity, response time, and response inhibition. Results: Repeated measures ANOVA revealed that participants had varying, largely uncertain, expectations regarding tDCS effectiveness at baseline. Expectation ratings significantly increased or decreased in response to High or Low priming, respectively, and decreased following the intervention. Response times and accuracy on motor and cognitive measures were largely unaffected by expectation or stimulation conditions. Overall, our analysis revealed no effect attributable to baseline expectations, belief of group assignment, or experimental condition on behavioral outcomes. Subjective experience did not differ based on expectation or stimulation condition. Conclusions: Our results suggest no clear effects of tDCS or of expectations on our performance measures, highlighting the need for further investigations of such stimulation methods.