Clinical Research Directory

Effects of Cognitive Training on Executive Functions and Decision-Making in Adolescent Female Volleyball Players

This randomized controlled trial aims to evaluate the effects of a four-week tablet-based cognitive training program on executive functions and on-court decision-making performance in adolescent female volleyball players. Fifty licensed female volleyball players aged 12 to 14 years were randomly assigned to either an intervention group or a control group. The intervention group received cognitive training three times per week in addition to routine volleyball training, while the control group continued routine training only. Executive functions were assessed using the Stroop Test, Trail Making Test-A, Go/No-Go Test, and 2-Back Test. Volleyball-specific decision-making performance was evaluated using a video-based temporal occlusion test. The study investigates whether improvements in executive functions following cognitive training transfer to sport-specific decision-making performance.

Sharing Tales That Teach: Shared Picturebook Reading for Early Childhood Emotional and Cognitive Development

Sharing Tales That Teach is a randomised study of a shared picturebook reading programme for 4- to 5-year-old children and their primary caregivers. The study will test whether a caregiver-delivered, emotion-focused shared reading programme leads to greater improvements in children's emotion regulation than a standard dialogic shared reading programme. Emotion regulation refers to children's developing ability to understand, express and manage emotions in ways that support learning, relationships and wellbeing. These skills are closely linked with executive function, including children's ability to remember instructions, control impulses and shift flexibly between activities. Shared picturebook reading may provide a natural, low-cost way for caregivers to support these skills through everyday interaction. Families in the randomised part of the study will be allocated to one of two 8-week shared reading programmes. In the emotion-focused group, caregivers will receive training in strategies such as naming emotions, discussing why characters feel as they do, talking about consequences of emotions and modelling ways to manage feelings. In the comparison group, caregivers will receive training in standard dialogic picturebook reading strategies, such as naming, describing, sequencing and asking open questions, without an explicit focus on emotions or emotion regulation. Both groups will use the same picturebooks and will be asked to complete three shared reading sessions per week at home. The main hypothesis is that children in the emotion-focused shared reading group will show greater improvement in emotion regulation from baseline to 12-month follow-up than children in the standard dialogic shared reading group. The study will also examine whether the programme affects children's executive function, caregiver wellbeing and caregiver emotion regulation. Additional exploratory analyses will examine caregiver-child interaction processes and whether caregiver or child characteristics are associated with different intervention effects. The study will recruit caregiver-child dyads through state primary schools in Greater London. Children will complete age-appropriate tasks and caregivers will complete questionnaires at baseline and follow-up. A laboratory subsample may also complete additional behavioural, observational and neurophysiological assessments. The study is low risk, non-invasive and does not involve medical treatment.

Development of Executive Functions in Children and Adolescents: Establishment of a Reference Norm for the Assessment of Executive Functions in Ecological Settings (eEFEe Tool)

The aim of this interventional study is to develop a normative reference for the ecological assessment of executive functions in children and adolescents using the eEFEe tool. Executive functions are high-level cognitive abilities that support planning, behavioral regulation, and problem solving in everyday life. Current neuropsychological tests often fail to reflect real-life functioning. The eEFEe tool was designed to assess these abilities through tasks that simulate daily situations. The study will include healthy children and adolescents aged 7 to 18 years, enrolled in regular schools in France. Participants will complete the eEFEe ecological tasks, as well as standardized cognitive and social cognition assessments, and parents will provide sociodemographic information. Results from this study will be used to establish reference norms for the eEFEe tool and to examine how executive function performance varies according to age, cognitive development, and sociodemographic factors. These normative data will later support the clinical use of the eEFEe tool to better identify executive difficulties in children and adolescents.

Smoothie Program for Achieving and Resilient Kids

The proposed study will examine whether eating yogurt every day can improve brain and gut health in children. Prior research suggests that yogurt may support cognitive functions like self-control, but more studies are needed to confirm this. The study will follow 60 children from Central Pennsylvania, ages 8 to 10, who will be randomly assigned to drink either fruit juice (control group) or yogurt smoothies once or twice a day for four weeks. Researchers will compare how different amounts of yogurt affect children's thinking skills (like memory and focus), brain activity, and gut bacteria. These changes will be measured through brain scans, computer-based thinking tasks, surveys, and stool samples. The study will also collect information about children's overall diet. The goal is to find out if yogurt can support healthy brain and gut development and to determine the right amount to include in a child's daily diet. Results will help guide future research on how nutrition supports children's health.

Boosting Executive Function With Real-class Exercise

The goal of this study is to examine the effects of acute pre-class physical exercise on executive function in real classroom settings. The main question it aims to answer is, "Does acute pre-class exercise enhance executive function compared to sedentary conditions?" Participants were students from primary school assigned by class to engage in one of several pre-class conditions: mentally passive sitting, mentally active sitting, 5-minute physical exercise, or 10-minute physical exercise. A cluster-randomized trial design was used to ensure ecological validity in authentic classroom environments. Cognitive tasks measuring inhibitory control were administered at baseline and pre-/post-class. The results indicate that pre-class exercise leads to greater improvements in inhibitory control than sedentary conditions, suggesting that integrating brief exercise sessions before lessons may be an effective strategy to optimize learning in educational contexts.