Dr. Thomas S. Redick, assistant professor of psychology at Indiana University-Purdue University Columbus (IUPUC), is part of a grant project including researchers from the Georgia Institute of Technology to understand whether cognitive abilities such as fluid intelligence, multitasking, and temporary memory can be improved using a specific type of cognitive intervention.
Cognition and brain science is the study of the mental processes that influence human thought and behavior, such as memory, language, and visual processing. The neural structure underlying these processes are also studied.
The three-year, $150,000 Office of Naval Research grant continues a previous project that began when Redick was a post-doctoral researcher working with Dr. Randall Engle of Georgia Tech’s School of Psychology, who directs the university’s Center for Advanced Brain Imaging.
Redick, who joined the IUPUC faculty in 2011, is a graduate of Georgia Tech. An experimental psychologist, he is trained in cognition, cognitive neuroscience, quantitative statistics, and cognitive aging. His research focus on variations in cognitive control and higher-order cognition.
“If your mind wanders when you are reading, if you sometimes forget why you walked into a room, or if you make the wrong turn at an intersection you pass every day, these are examples of when cognition fails. I try to understand how situational variables impact these failures. I’m also interested in the study of cognition after traumatic brain injuries, specifically as it relates to return-to-play decisions after sports-related concussions,” he explained.
According to Redick, in the early 20th-century, most psychologists believed “fluid intelligence” was relatively fixed after adolescence until the declines that often develop during the normal human aging process.
“Fluid intelligence is the ability to reason quickly and think abstractly. It focuses on one’s current ability to reason and deal with complex information. This type of intelligence tends to decline during the normal aging process for many individuals,” Redick explained.
Interventions to improve fluid intelligence in children have been largely unsuccessful so far. Recently, some researchers have claimed success in training or improving cognition through repeated practice of a computerized task.
But Redick and his colleagues find no evidence that one specific type of cognitive training provided any objective improvements in cognitive abilities, despite subjects' personal beliefs that their memory, attention, or intelligence had improved.
“Our research will examine whether specific, applied outcomes related to reading comprehension, attention control, and second-language development are possible after brief cognitive training in college students,” he said.
Redick and the Georgia Tech team hope to devote future study to the same outcomes in children and elderly adults. The research has been of interest to the Office of Naval Research in their effort to seek new ways to improve cognitive functioning in Navy and Marine recruits.
For more information, contact Dr. Redick at 812.348.7236 or tsredick@iupuc.edu.