• Journal of Korean Society of Neurocognitive Rehabilitation
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.1-7
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• 2018

The study has compared normally developed children and children who were diagnosed as autism spectrum in goal management training them to observe the effect. The research was conducted to four normally developed children and four children who were diagnosed as autism spectrum, and all subjects were provided with identical goal management training. The children and the caregivers have selected desired objectives activity, and all three activities were followed by goal management training. Intervention periods were conducted ten times in total, two times a week for five weeks, and eight subjects in the two groups were trained one on one by the researcher. The training time was 40 minutes for every session. The descriptive statistics and frequency analysis were used as the statistical method, and the Mann-Whitney test, the nonparametric statistical analysis, was conducted to compare the difference between the two groups. Goal management training for two groups did not show a statistically significant difference in terms of the performance status of Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (p>.05). In the summary of Bruininks-Oseretsky Test of Motor Proficiency (2nd) which evaluates the motor skill, there was a statistically significant difference between the autism spectrum disorder group and normal group (p<.05). Additionally, the two groups showed a statistically significant difference in eye-hand coordination sub-test among Developmental Test of Visual Perception (2nd) which evaluates the visual perception performance (p<.05). The research has confirmed the applicability of goal management training to children with autism spectrum compared to the normally developed children, and it has confirmed the effectiveness of the training.

• Journal of Korean Society of Neurocognitive Rehabilitation
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• v.10 no.2
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• pp.35-44
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• 2018

This study was conducted to explore the effects of semi-structured $DIRFloortime^{(R)}$ treatment on the enhancement of language comprehension and information processing of children with high-performance autistic spectrum disabilities. We measured the general characteristics of the test subjects, which are level of autism, total intelligence, language comprehension and information processing indicators. The intervention method used was a semi-structured $DIRFloortime^{(R)}$ therapy using board game intervention program after revising and supplementing the expert content validity. A pre/post-test for a group was designed as a similar experiment and the pre/post test was initiated with the t certification at .05 of significance level. After initiating the program, the post test has shown that the language comprehension indicators showed statistically significant levels of difference (p<.001) and the information processing indicator also had a statistically significant effect (p<.001). There was a statistically significant difference (p<.001) in the level of verbal comprehension index after the program implementation, and statistically significant differences in the information processing index (p<.001). The semi-structured $DIRFloortime^{(R)}$ treatment using boardgames for enhancing the language comprehension and information processing indicators of children with high performance autistic spectrum disorder had a significant effect.

• Journal of the Korean Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.123-131
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• 2017

Objectives: Executive dysfunction including working memory deficit has been suggested to be one of the major neuropsychological etiologies of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The purpose of this study was to investigate the augmentative effects of Cogmed working memory training on the symptoms and neurocognitive functions in medicated children and adolescents with ADHD. Methods: Twenty-five children with ADHD, aged 7 to 19 years, taking ADHD medication participated in this study. The participants were trained for 5 weeks with a commercially available and computerized working memory program ($Cogmed^{(R)}$) without any changes to their medication. The Korean version of the ADHD Rating Scale, Clinical Global Impression Scale, and Comprehensive Attention Test were administered before training and 4 weeks and 7 months after training, respectively. Results: After completing the training, the clinical symptoms and function, rated by the parents and clinician, were improved. In addition, the level of commission errors was significantly reduced in the selective attention (visual/auditory) task, sustained attention to response task, and flanker task. The untrained visuospatial short-term memory and working memory were also improved. These effects were still observed 7 months after the training. Conclusion: Cogmed working memory training can be a promising training option for the additional improvement of the symptoms and deficits in working memory and response inhibition in medicated children with ADHD.

• Journal of Oriental Neuropsychiatry
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• v.24 no.1
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• pp.63-74
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• 2013

Objectives : The purpose of this study is to examine the effects of 3 day Forests healing programs for cognitive improvement, which consists of helpful contents of Korean medicine. Methods : This study examined the effects of forests healing for mild cognitive impairment patients, who visited a Korean medicine hospital neuropsychiatry clinic for outpatients. The Forests healing programs for cognitive improvement was run with 24 participants, in which 9 of them quit in the middle of the program, so excluded in data analysis. The Forests healing programs for cognitive improvement was consisted of 3 day helpful Korean medicine contents. The primary outcome measurement was a Computerized Neurocognitive Test (CNT), which measured the cognitive functions with computer programs. Results : The results of this study showed that CNT scores were not significantly changed after 3 day forests healing. General psychological states, including depression, anxiety, and anger, were also checked. Among them, depressive mood significantly improved. Quality of life (QOL) was also enhanced after 3 day program. These results indicate that the 3 day Forests healing programs for cognitive improvement was effective for depressive mood and QOL of mild cognitive impairment patients, but not enough for cognitive functions directly. Conclusions : The 3 day Forests healing programs for cognitive improvement were shown to be an effective intervention in improving some aspects of mild cognitive impairment patients, including depressive mood, and QOL. We suggest that repeated participation of this program can enhance cognitive function of mild cognitive impairment patients.

• Journal of the Korean Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
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• v.22 no.4
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• pp.302-306
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• 2011

Objectives : To investigate the cognitive functions of pediatric cancer patients and to test the hypotheses that the impairment of processing speed and working memory are more prevalent in children with medulloblastoma (MBL) compared to children with neuroblastoma (NBL). Methods : We gave the Korean version of the Wechsler Intelligent Scale for Children-III to 21 children with MBL and 24 children with NBL during outpatient follow-up after the treatment was completed. Results : Children with MBL showed below average performance across most of the sub-tests. The full scale IQ, verbal IQ, and performance IQ of children with MBL were significantly lower than those of children with NBL. There were significant differences between two groups in coding and Digit Span subtest scores. Children with MBL performed especially poorly in the coding subtest. Conclusion : These findings support previous reports of generally low IQ and the dysfunction of processing speed and working memory among children with MBL, a kind of central nervous system tumor. Further investigation is needed to determine how the deficit of processing speed and working memory affect neurocognitive development and general intelligent functions.

• Korean Journal of Clinical Laboratory Science
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• v.50 no.4
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• pp.492-500
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• 2018

This study examined the effects of a dual-task virtual reality program on the cognitive function and EEG for patients with mild cognitive impairment. A dual-task virtual reality program was performed in the experimental groups while conventional occupational therapy was carried out in the control group for 30 minutes per session, which was done five days per week for 6 weeks. The results were as follows. First, the memory of the cognitive function and balance was improved significantly in the experimental group with the dual-task virtual reality program compared to the control group with the traditional occupational therapy. Second, EEG was also increased significantly in the experimental group compared to the control group. The results of this study suggest that the dual-task virtual reality program was an effective treatment method for the elderly with mild cognitive impairment and would be a cornerstone of basic data that will be helpful to those suffering from a range of diseases.

• Pediatric Gastroenterology, Hepatology & Nutrition
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• v.22 no.3
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• pp.249-261
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• 2019

Purpose: The neural processing of children with overweight/obesity (CWO), may affect their eating behavior. We investigated the visual information processing of CWO under response control condition, by event-related potential (ERP) study, an electrophysiologic study for cognitive mechanism. Methods: Seventeen CWO (mean age: $10.6{\pm}1.9$), and 17 age-matched non-obese children (NOC), participated in the study. Neurocognitive function tests and visual ERP under Go/NoGo conditions, were implemented. Area amplitudes of major ERP components (P1, N1, P2, N2, and P3) from four scalp locations (frontal, central, parietal, and occipital), were analyzed. Results: For Go and NoGo conditions, CWO had significantly greater occipital P1, frontocentral N1, and P2 amplitudes compared with NOC. P2 amplitude was significantly greater in CWO, than in NOC, at the frontal location. N2 amplitude was not significantly different, between CWO and NOC. For CWO and NOC, Go P3 amplitude was highest at the parietal location, and NoGo P3 amplitude was highest at the frontal location. In Go and NoGo conditions, P3 amplitude of CWO was significantly less than in NOC. Conclusion: The greater P1, N1, and P2 suggested hyper-vigilance to visual stimuli of CWO, but the smaller P3 suggested insufficient mental representation of them. Such altered visual processing, may affect the eating behavior of CWO.

• Dementia and Neurocognitive Disorders
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• v.22 no.2
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• pp.69-77
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• 2023

Background and Purpose: The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) has been known as a screening test for detecting mild cognitive impairment (MCI) better than Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). However, in previous domestic studies, no significant difference was found in the discriminability between MoCA and MMSE. Researchers have suggested that this might be because older Koreans are less educated than older Westerners. This study was conducted to examine the effect of education on the discriminability of MoCA compared to the MMSE. Methods: Participants were 123 cognitively normal elderly, 118 with vascular MCI, 108 with amnestic MCI, 121 with vascular dementia, and 113 with dementia of the Alzheimer's type. The Korean-MoCA (K-MoCA) and Korean-MMSE (K-MMSE) were administered. Multiple regression analyses and receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analyses were performed. Results: In all participants, education significantly affected both K-MoCA and K-MMSE scores along with age. The effect of education was re-examined by subgroup analysis after dividing subjects according to the level of education. Effect of education on K-MoCA and K-MMSE was only shown in the group with <9 years of education. ROC curve analyses revealed that the discriminability of K-MoCA to differentiate between vascular MCI and normal elderly was significantly higher than that of K-MMSE. When re-examining subgroups divided by education level, however, this higher discriminability of K-MoCA disappeared in the group with <9 years of education. Conclusions: These results indicate no difference in discriminating cognitive deficits between K-MoCA and K-MMSE in Korean elderly with <9 years of education.

• Dementia and Neurocognitive Disorders
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.1-10
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• 2024

Background and Purpose: Voice, reflecting cerebral functions, holds potential for analyzing and understanding brain function, especially in the context of cognitive impairment (CI) and Alzheimer's disease (AD). This study used voice data to distinguish between normal cognition and CI or Alzheimer's disease dementia (ADD). Methods: This study enrolled 3 groups of subjects: 1) 52 subjects with subjective cognitive decline; 2) 110 subjects with mild CI; and 3) 59 subjects with ADD. Voice features were extracted using Mel-frequency cepstral coefficients and Chroma. Results: A deep neural network (DNN) model showed promising performance, with an accuracy of roughly 81% in 10 trials in predicting ADD, which increased to an average value of about 82.0%±1.6% when evaluated against unseen test dataset. Conclusions: Although results did not demonstrate the level of accuracy necessary for a definitive clinical tool, they provided a compelling proof-of-concept for the potential use of voice data in cognitive status assessment. DNN algorithms using voice offer a promising approach to early detection of AD. They could improve the accuracy and accessibility of diagnosis, ultimately leading to better outcomes for patients.

• Dementia and Neurocognitive Disorders
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• v.23 no.1
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• pp.44-53
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• 2024

Background and purpose: The anti-aging standard forest healing program (ASFHP), which uses forest therapy, was reported to be effective in improving psychological, physical, and cognitive functions. However, there are several challenges to directly visiting the forest. This study aimed to investigate the impact of multi-session ASFHP with forest visit on the mental and physical health of the older people with visits to forest facilities and compared them with those of the same program conducted indoors. Methods: Individuals aged over 70 years with concerns about cognitive decline were recruited at dementia relief centers and divided into control and experimental groups. A total of 33 people were administered ASFHP under the supervision of a forest therapy instructor. The control group stayed indoors, while the experimental group visited a forest healing center and repeated the program 20 weeks. Results: The multiple-session ASFHP positively affected cognitive impairment screening test (CIST) total scores (p=0.002), memory (p=0.014), Korean version of the Repeatable Battery for the Assessment of Neuropsychological Status total scores (p<0.001), immediate recall (p=0.001), visuospatial/construction (p<0.001), language (p<0.001), forest healing standard questionnaire total scores (p=0.002), and cognitive function (p=0.019), regardless of location. The forest visits during the ASFHP showed positive effects on orientation (p=0.035), delayed recall (p=0.042), emotional stability (p=0.032), physical activity (p=0.005), and health (p=0.022). The CIST scores of the memory domain were the strongest indicator of the multiple-session ASFHP effects. Conclusions: The 20-week multi-session ASFHP with forest visit showed effects on cognitive improvement and physical and emotional stability compared to indoor education.