TY  - JOUR
AU  - Fischer, Florian U
AU  - Kollmann, Bianca
AU  - Wolf, Dominik
AU  - Sebastian, Alexandra
AU  - Knaepen, Kristel
AU  - Riedel, David
AU  - Mierau, Andreas
AU  - Ruffini, Nicolas
AU  - Endres, Kristina
AU  - Winter, Jennifer
AU  - Strüder, Heiko K
AU  - Bischof, Gerard N
AU  - Faraza, Sofia
AU  - Baier, Bernhard
AU  - Binder, Harald
AU  - Drzezga, Alexander
AU  - Teipel, Stefan
AU  - Fellgiebel, Andreas
AU  - Tüscher, Oliver
TI  - Cognitive training gain transfer in cognitively healthy aging: per protocol results of the German AgeGain study.
JO  - Frontiers in aging neuroscience
VL  - 17
SN  - 1663-4365
CY  - Lausanne
PB  - Frontiers Research Foundation
M1  - DZNE-2025-01113
SP  - 1587395
PY  - 2025
AB  - Cognitive decline is part of the normal aging process, but also a major risk factor for dementia. Cognitive training interventions aim to attenuate cognitive decline, but training gains need to be transferable to untrained cognitive abilities to influence everyday function. Furthermore, the neurobiological basis of cognitive training gain transfer remains elusive. A possible candidate is increased bilateral hemisphere usage enabled by efficient structural connectivity, especially of prefrontal regions. Therefore, the present multicentric study used a cognitive training intervention to demonstrate training transfer and identify neurobiological modulators of successful transfer.In total 235 subjects were enrolled in AgeGain; 180 underwent a broad 4-week cognitive training intervention at three study sites. Pre- and post-training neuropsychological testing was conducted and successful transferers were identified according to preregistered definitions. Pre-training, subjects underwent diffusion and functional MRI to assess interhemispheric connectivity, measured as microstructural integrity of the corpus callosum and lateralization of functional activation patterns during a cognitive control task. Logistic regression models were estimated to predict successful transfer based on structural connectivity and bilateralization of activation patterns.Out of 180 subjects, 74 showed short-term training gain transfer that was maintained over 3 months in 19 subjects. Neither microstructural integrity of the corpus callosum, nor bilateralized activation predicted training gain transfer alone. However, their interaction was associated with long-term transfer over 3 months: subjects with higher mean diffusivity of the corpus callosum and more bilateral functional activity or conversely with lower diffusivity of the corpus callosum and more lateral functional activity were more likely successful long-term transferers.We demonstrated successful training gain transfer in 41.1
KW  - cognitive training (Other)
KW  - cognitive transfer (Other)
KW  - functional connectivity (Other)
KW  - healthy aging (Other)
KW  - interhemispheric structural connectivity (Other)
LB  - PUB:(DE-HGF)16
C6  - pmid:40933821
C2  - pmc:PMC12417520
DO  - DOI:10.3389/fnagi.2025.1587395
UR  - https://pub.dzne.de/record/281366
ER  -