Periodic Reporting for period 1 - VirtualSync (An embodied perspective on anosognosia)
Período documentado: 2018-10-01 hasta 2020-09-30
Lack of awareness about deficient aspects of memory functioning (usually described as “anosognosia”) is often described in patients suffering from Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), affecting between the 20% and 80% of the total number of diagnosed individuals. A growing body of studies exploring these deficits in both neurological and psychiatric patients suggested that the visual perspective in which the information is presented has a key role in modulating self-awareness. Indeed, there is preliminary evidence suggesting that neurological patients might show better awareness when evaluating abilities of other people or even of themselves, if seen “from the outside”, i.e. shifting from a first person-perspective (1PP) to a third-person one (3PP) (Clare et al., 2012; Bertrand et al., 2016, Riva et al., 2019). The overall aim of VIRTUALSYNC project is to investigate the role of visual perspective in modulating both the objective memory performance and the subjective perception of memory functioning in healthy and clinical populuation.
The specific goals of this project and the work carried out are:
1. To investigate the effect of switching between the first (1PP) and the third (3PP) visual perspective in the objective memory performance (Work Pack Package 1, WP1);
2. To design and develop a novel “embodied machine” able to sustain the switch from the first-person perspective to the third-person one (WP2);
2. To examine the effect of the “embodied machine” in reducing metamemory deficits in patients with mild AD (WP3);
4. To promote the implementation and dissemination of evidence-based interventions and tools developed by project to the scientific/clinical community and to the general public (WP4).
The specific goals of this project and the work carried out are:
1. To investigate the effect of switching between the first (1PP) and the third (3PP) visual perspective in the objective memory performance (Work Pack Package 1, WP1);
2. To design and develop a novel “embodied machine” able to sustain the switch from the first-person perspective to the third-person one (WP2);
2. To examine the effect of the “embodied machine” in reducing metamemory deficits in patients with mild AD (WP3);
4. To promote the implementation and dissemination of evidence-based interventions and tools developed by project to the scientific/clinical community and to the general public (WP4).
The project consisted of three interdependent work packages (WPs) to address the above-mentioned research questions and provide empirical evidence of the role of visual perspective in modulating both the objective memory performance and the subjective perception of memory functioning.
The general aim of WP1 was to investigate the role of visual perspective in modulating the objective memory in both young participants and older adults. To reach this aim, we carried out two experimental studies to evaluate the differences in memory performance between events encoded in first- vs. third-person perspective (1PP vs. 3PP) in both young participants and older ones with a Virtual Reality (VR)-based episodic memory platform. Additionally, we also investigated the construct validity of the VR-based episodic memory platform by evaluating the correlations between memory indices obtained from this procedure and scores from traditional episodic memory tasks. As predicted, results indicated that the encoding of events in 1PP promoted a better memory recall, as compared to events encoded in 3PP for young adults. Older adults did not benefit from the first-person advantage. Moreover, findings indicated the feasibility of the procedure: the performance on the VR-based episodic memory was positively correlated with the performance the traditional episodic memory tests, thus supporting its use in studies with patients presenting cognitive impairments. The general aim of WP3 was to investigate the role of visual perspective in modulating the subjective perception of memory functioning in two clinical populations: participants suffering from subjective memory complaints and participants with mild cognitive impairments. We evaluated differences in their ability to correctly predict and estimate their memory performance (i.e. metacognitive abilities) before and after the administration of the VR-based episodic assessment in first- vs. third-person perspective (1PP vs. 3PP). As predicted, results showed that participants were more accurate in estimating their memory performance after exposed to the 3PP condition.
Globally, findings from healthy and clinical populations carried out during the entire period of the project demonstrated the value of perspective-switching as a technique to modulate both the objective memory performance and the subjective perception of memory functioning, that are relevant to the goals of the project.
From a technological point of view, the full set of technologies developed by the VIRTUALSYNC project (see Figure 1) includes:
- the final release of the “embodied machine”, namely a VR-based platform able to sustain the switching from the first-person to a third-person perspective during a memory task in simulated real-life settings, to be used in laboratory experiments with both healthy and clinical population;
- the final release of the online version of the “embodied machine” to be used in remote experiments.
Finally, the dissemination activities for VIRTUALSYNC Project (WP4) included different channels and achieved several results:
1) Scientific community: Project results have been presented in international conferences and several workshops. Moreover, an international conference was successfully organized to actively communicate the use of VR for neuroscience research and clinical practice, relevant topics for the VIRTUALSYNC Project. We plan to disseminate findings via publications in open access top-tier journals & conference presentations. These activities will be promoted in the project website and trough the social media account.
2) Non-scientific community: The project website (https://myspacelab.ch/VirtualSync/(se abrirá en una nueva ventana)) has been successfully set-up to share information and news about project’ activities. In addition, to make project activities more accessible/closer to the target community – older adults and patients with cognitive impairments, we have also organized open days at the host institution with demos showing the role of VR technologies for the cognitive assessment of memory.
The general aim of WP1 was to investigate the role of visual perspective in modulating the objective memory in both young participants and older adults. To reach this aim, we carried out two experimental studies to evaluate the differences in memory performance between events encoded in first- vs. third-person perspective (1PP vs. 3PP) in both young participants and older ones with a Virtual Reality (VR)-based episodic memory platform. Additionally, we also investigated the construct validity of the VR-based episodic memory platform by evaluating the correlations between memory indices obtained from this procedure and scores from traditional episodic memory tasks. As predicted, results indicated that the encoding of events in 1PP promoted a better memory recall, as compared to events encoded in 3PP for young adults. Older adults did not benefit from the first-person advantage. Moreover, findings indicated the feasibility of the procedure: the performance on the VR-based episodic memory was positively correlated with the performance the traditional episodic memory tests, thus supporting its use in studies with patients presenting cognitive impairments. The general aim of WP3 was to investigate the role of visual perspective in modulating the subjective perception of memory functioning in two clinical populations: participants suffering from subjective memory complaints and participants with mild cognitive impairments. We evaluated differences in their ability to correctly predict and estimate their memory performance (i.e. metacognitive abilities) before and after the administration of the VR-based episodic assessment in first- vs. third-person perspective (1PP vs. 3PP). As predicted, results showed that participants were more accurate in estimating their memory performance after exposed to the 3PP condition.
Globally, findings from healthy and clinical populations carried out during the entire period of the project demonstrated the value of perspective-switching as a technique to modulate both the objective memory performance and the subjective perception of memory functioning, that are relevant to the goals of the project.
From a technological point of view, the full set of technologies developed by the VIRTUALSYNC project (see Figure 1) includes:
- the final release of the “embodied machine”, namely a VR-based platform able to sustain the switching from the first-person to a third-person perspective during a memory task in simulated real-life settings, to be used in laboratory experiments with both healthy and clinical population;
- the final release of the online version of the “embodied machine” to be used in remote experiments.
Finally, the dissemination activities for VIRTUALSYNC Project (WP4) included different channels and achieved several results:
1) Scientific community: Project results have been presented in international conferences and several workshops. Moreover, an international conference was successfully organized to actively communicate the use of VR for neuroscience research and clinical practice, relevant topics for the VIRTUALSYNC Project. We plan to disseminate findings via publications in open access top-tier journals & conference presentations. These activities will be promoted in the project website and trough the social media account.
2) Non-scientific community: The project website (https://myspacelab.ch/VirtualSync/(se abrirá en una nueva ventana)) has been successfully set-up to share information and news about project’ activities. In addition, to make project activities more accessible/closer to the target community – older adults and patients with cognitive impairments, we have also organized open days at the host institution with demos showing the role of VR technologies for the cognitive assessment of memory.
From a theoretical stance, the results obtained by VIRTUALSYNC project, merging recent advances of memory studies and self-awareness literature, with the technological advances of VR technology suggested that the perspective-switching can be used as innovative instrument to help individuals to be aware of their own skills in different clinical populations. In this perspective, one potential further exploitation of the VIRTUALSYNC project is to expand the findings obtained to exploit the value of perspective-switching as an innovative strategy for improving awareness about memory performance in both psychiatric and neurological populations.
From a technological point of view, the VR-based task is already available also for remote testing, and data obtained from this project validated its feasibility. Given the rapid distribution of low-cost head-mounted displays, it will be possible to reach a large number of people to run large-scale validation studies or to develop cutting-edge trainings based on perspective-switching, which clearly goes beyond the state-of-the-art in the field of aging research and treatment.
From a technological point of view, the VR-based task is already available also for remote testing, and data obtained from this project validated its feasibility. Given the rapid distribution of low-cost head-mounted displays, it will be possible to reach a large number of people to run large-scale validation studies or to develop cutting-edge trainings based on perspective-switching, which clearly goes beyond the state-of-the-art in the field of aging research and treatment.