Cognitive remediation for severe mental illness: state of the field and future directions

Source: Carmen Black, Matthew Goldenberg, and Jaideep Talwalkar; Yale School of Medicine
The mental status exam is a clinical evaluation of emotional, perceptual, and cognitive functioning that spans both the fields of psychiatry and neurology. Developing skill in the psychiatric portions of the examination are important to describe salient aspects of the patient's mental state that may be observed during routine history and/or physical exam. Proficiency in the cognitive portions...

Source: Laboratory of Jonathan Flombaum—Johns Hopkins University

This study presents a novel transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) protocol combined with cognitive stimulation to address post-stroke hemispatial neglect. Initial data from a pilot patient ensure the procedure's feasibility and suggest potential efficacy, providing a foundation for a future parallel, triple-blind, controlled clinical...

Social psychologists have documented that feeling good about ourselves and maintaining positive self-esteem is a powerful motivator of human behavior (Tavris & Aronson, 2008). In the United States, members of the predominant culture typically think very highly of themselves and view themselves as good people who are above average on many desirable traits (Ehrlinger, Gilovich, & Ross, 2005). Often, our behavior, attitudes, and beliefs are affected when we experience a threat to our...

Cognition encompasses mental processes such as memory, perception, decision-making reasoning and language. Cognitive scientists are using a combination of behavioral and neuropsychological techniques to investigate the underlying neural substrates of cognition. They are interested in understanding how information is perceived, processed and how does it affect the final execution of behaviors. With this knowledge, researchers hope to develop new treatments for individuals with cognitive...

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) over the cerebellum exerts a remote effect on the prefrontal cortex, which can modulate cognition and performance. This was demonstrated using two information-processing tasks of varying complexity, whereby only cathodal tDCS improved performance when the task was difficult, but not...