Massimo Nucci

Cognitive Reserve Index questionnaire (CRIq): a new instrument for measuring cognitive reserve.

Background and aims: The concept of “reserve” has been used to explain the difference between individuals in their capacity to cope with or compensate for pathology. Brain reserve refers to structural aspects of the brain, such as brain size and synapse count. Cognitive reserve is the ability to optimize and maximize performance through two mechanisms: recruitment of brain networks, and/or compensation by alternative cognitive strategies. The aim of the present research was to devise an instrument for comprehensive assessment and measurement of the quantity of cognitive reserve accumulated by individuals throughout their lifespan. Methods: A new approach using the Cognitive Reserve Index questionnaire (CRIq) was developed and tested in a sample of 588 healthy individuals, from 18 to 102 years old, stratified by age (Young, Adults, Elderly) and gender. The CRIq includes demographic data and items grouped into three sections: education, working activity and leisure time, each of which returns a subscore. The WAIS Vocabulary test and TIB were also administered. Results: The main descriptive features and some inferential results are described. Intelligence was only moderately correlated with cognitive reserve, stressing the distinction between these two concepts. Age and gender significantly affected CRIq scores, whereas no effect emerged from their interaction. Adults showed a higher score than Young and Elderly. Conclusions: This study provides a new instrument for a standardized measure of the cognitive reserve accumulated by individuals through their lifespan. The potential use of the CRIq in both experimental research and clinical practice is discussed.

Goodness of Regularity in Dot Patterns: Global Symmetry, Local Symmetry, and Their Interactions

Goodness is a classic Gestalt notion defined as salience or perceptual strength of a given pattern. All operational models of goodness have assigned a central role to mirror symmetry but not much attention has been paid to the distinction between global and local mirror symmetry, and their possible interactions. We designed eight different types of dot patterns (all consisting of 80 dots), combining different numbers (0, 1, and 2) and relative orientations (parallel or orthogonal to each other) of local and global axes of symmetry (affecting 50% or 100% of the dots, respectively) at different absolute orientations (vertical and horizontal). Each of 640 trials consisted of a short presentation of a new dot pattern, which subjects had to classify as regular or random. We hypothesised that the overall goodness of patterns is not the simple sum of the amount of regularity present in them but depends on the cooperation and competition between symmetries. The results confirmed our hypothesis, showing that performance in this regularity-detection task did not increase in a linear way when some symmetries were added to other symmetries.

Evaluating Uncertainty of Model Acceptability in Empirical Applications: A Replacement Approach

A major problem in psychological measurements is that in some circum-tances there is no basis to assume that subjects are responding honestly. Some individuals actually tend to distort their responses in order to reach specific goals. For example, in personnel selection some subjects are likely to fake a personality questionnaire to match the ideal candidate’s profile (positive impression management). Similarly, in the administration of diagnostic tests individuals often attempt to malinger posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in order to secure financial gain and/or treatment, or to avoid being charged with a crime.

Empirical Scenarios of Fake Data Analysis: The Sample Generation by Replacement (SGR) Approach

Many self-report measures of attitudes, beliefs, personality, and pathology include items whose responses can be easily manipulated or distorted, as an example in order to give a positive impression to others, to obtain financial compensation, to avoid being charged with a crime, to get a job, or else. This fact confronts both researchers and practitioners with the crucial problem of biases yielded by the usage of standard statistical models. The current paper presents three empirical applications to the issue of faking of a recent probabilistic perturbation procedure called Sample Generation by Replacement (SGR; Lombardi and Pastore, 2012). With the intent to study the behavior of some statistics under fake perturbation and data reconstruction processes, ad-hoc faking scenarios were implemented and tested. Overall, results proved that SGR could be successfully applied both in the case of research designs traditionally proposed in order to deal with faking (e.g., use of fake-detecting scales, experimentally induced faking, or contrasting applicants vs. incumbents), and in the case of ecological research settings, where no information as regards faking could be collected by the researcher or the practitioner. Implications and limitations are presented and discussed.

Adaptation of the Cognitive Reserve Index Questionnaire (CRIq) for the Greek population

Cognitive reserve (CR) is thought to reflect the cumulative brain potential derived from various cognitively demanding activities throughout the entire life. It seems to mediate both one’s cognitive performance and clinical expression of different brain pathologies, such as Alzheimer’s disease. Many researchers have tried to assess CR by using proxies, such as educational and occupational level, participation in leisure time activities and intelligence, alone or in various combinations. Recently, a new tool for measuring CR status was constructed, the Cognitive Reserve Index questionnaire (CRIq), comprising of all known CR proxies. CRIq also takes into account the amount of time spent during each of these activities, thus capturing the core idea behind CR theory: its active day to day formulation during all age stages. Aim of the present study was to adapt CRIq for the Greek population. The questionnaire was administered to 591 participants (age range 18–89) stratified in three age groups (young adults, middle-aged, elderly). The middle-aged group showed higher total CRI as well as CRI-Education, CRI-WorkingActivity and CRI-LeisureTime scores compared to both other groups, reflecting more years of engagement in all activities. Gender also influenced CRI scores, with men scoring higher than women, again resulting from historical and social perspectives. Overall, the CRIq showed satisfactory internal consistency, was easy to administer and its adaptation process provided solid and interpretable results. The Greek version of CRIq enriches existing dementia research methodology and allows for valid results in an ever growing field.

Designing and Testing Credibility: The Case of a Serious Game on Nightlife Risks

This paper describes a game directed to young adults and aimed at sensitizing them about potential risks of psychoactive substance abuse during nightlife events. Of interest here is that this game targets a domain in which the credibility of a persuasive intervention is particularly fragile. The design decisions and the recommendations inspiring them are described first, characterized by an effort to fit the context in which the game was going to be used. In addition, a field study with real users during nightlife events is reported (N = 136), in which several dimensions of the game credibility are evaluated and compared with the credibility of a serious information tool (leaflets) in a between-participant design. By describing this case, the opportunity is taken to emphasize the importance of serious games credibility, and to enumerate some of the occasions to improve its strength that can be found during its design to evaluation.

Valutazione della potenza nei confronti multipli: cinque metodi a confronto

In this paper, we present a comparison, in terms of power, among three classic procedures (Scheffe, Tukey, Bonferroni) and two methods based on the False Discovery Rate (FDR) in the context of multiple comparison. A Monte Carlo simulation is illustrated, in which we performed all the possible pairwise comparisons among k (k = 3,4,5,6) samples with fixed numerosity (20), by manipulating effect size. Three different definitions of power are considered, based on their possible application in psychological research. The results show that FDR-based procedures offer a better performance compared to the classical methods.