Efficacy of cognitive training on executive functions in healthy older adults: a systematic review with meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.

OBJECTIVE: Systematically review randomized controlled trials on the efficacy of cognitive training on executive functions in healthy older people. MEASURES: The outcome measures were related to inhibitory control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility. RESULTS: Thirty-one trials were included in the systematic review and thirteen trials in the meta-analysis. In the overall analysis, the cognitive training enhanced inhibitory control when measured by the Stroop task (p < .001, d = 1.64) and working memory when measured by the Corsi Block task (p = .002, d = .16). A marginal significance was found for working memory in the Digit Span task - Forward (p = .06, d = .92). However, cognitive training did not enhance inhibitory control when measured by the Go/No-Go task (p = .76, d = .59), working memory when measured by the Digit Span - Backward (p = .72, d = .95) and N-Back (p = .10, d = .26) tasks, and cognitive flexibility when measured by Trail Making - Part B (p = .08, d = .27) and Semantic Fluency (p = .49, d = .06) tasks. CONCLUSION: Mixed evidence was found for inhibitory control and working memory; cognitive flexibility showed no evidence of improvement.

Influence of Economic Scarcity on Race Perception.

Racial socioeconomic gaps are widened in periods of economic recession. Besides social and institutional factors, black people also struggle with many psychological factors. The literature reports racial-biased complex behaviors and high-level processes that are influenced by economic scarcity. A previous study found a bias at the perceptual level: an experimental manipulation of scarcity (a subliminal priming paradigm) lowered the black-white race categorization threshold. Here we present a conceptual replication in a higher ecological setup. In our main analysis we compared the categorization threshold of participants that received the Brazilian government's emergency economic aid in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic (n = 136) and participants that did not receive the economic aid (n = 135) in an online psychophysical task that presented faces in a black-white race continuum. Additionally, we analyzed the economic impact of COVID-19 on household income, and in cases of family unemployment. Our results do not support the claim that perception of race is influenced by economic scarcity. Interestingly, we found that when people differ greatly in terms of racial prejudice, they encode visual information related to race differently. People with higher scores on a prejudice scale needed more phenotypic traits of the black race to categorize a face as black. We discuss the results in terms of differences in method and sample.

The sex of body images modulates size estimations and lateralized responses in body perception.

Previous findings suggest a right hemispheric contribution to body image distortions only in women. Here we set out to replicate this finding and investigate whether the sex of the body image would play a role in this lateralization. We report here two experiments of body size estimation using the divided visual field methodology. In Experiment 1 we found no effect of visual field, participant sex, and body image sex. We discuss the results in terms of the androgynous-like stimuli appearance. In Experiment 2 we increased the dimorphism of body image stimuli. Surprisingly, we observed a different pattern. Both men and women overestimated the size of female models presented in both visual fields, but the size of male models was underestimated for presentations in the left visual field compared to presentations in the right visual field. We found no differences between men and women. Our results suggest that the differences in lateralization of body image distortions between men and women observed in previous studies can be attributed to the sex of the body image. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first study to show that the sex of the body image modulates lateralization and body image distortion.

Bilateral Femoral Neck Fracture Secondary to Seizure: Treatment with Total Hip Arthroplasty by the Direct Anterior approach.

Bilateral fracture of the femoral neck secondary to seizure is a rare event. The occurrence of these lesions is related to vigorous tonic-clonic muscular contractions and to the use of anticonvulsive medications. Femoral neck fractures in young adults treated with total hip arthroplasty are the exception, and the choice of surgical access should consider several factors; the direct anterior approach is a possibility for total hip arthroplasty. The authors present the case of a 36-year-old male with bilateral fracture of the femoral neck secondary to seizure, and in regular use of phenytoin. Due to the risk of fixation failure and prolonged evolution time, bilateral total hip arthroplasty was the procedure of choice. The choice of the approach should take into consideration the patient's anatomy, material availability, and surgeon's experience. Thus, the greater ease of preparation and positioning of the patient, the shorter hospital stay, the early postoperative rehabilitation, and the mastery of the technique by the surgeon, are possible justifications for the adoption of the direct anterior approach.