Prospective Memory Training in Parkinson Disease

Participants will attend four strategy training sessions total. In sessions 1 and 2, in addition to teaching about event- and time-based tasks, the trainer teaches the participant specific strategies for each type of task (implementation intentions for event-based and strategic clock-checking for time-based). In sessions 3 and 4, the trainer tells the participant s/he will be practicing both types of tasks in the training games and can support the participant's strategy use if needed. Feedback on accuracy and strategy use are provided after each training game. At the end of each session after completing the training games, the trainer and participant discuss how the strategies can be applied to the participant's real-life prospective memory goals, and the trainer helps the participant develop written action plans to do so. Plans are reviewed (and modified if necessary) at each session.

Participants will attend four process training sessions in this group. In sessions 1 and 2, the trainer teaches the participant about event- and time-based prospective memory tasks, respectively. In sessions 3 and 4, the trainer simply tells the participant that s/he will be practicing both types of tasks in the training games. In all sessions, the participant completes the training games with no strategy instruction from the trainer. Feedback on accuracy is provided after each training game. At the end of each session after completing both training games, the trainer reminds the participant of his/her real-life prospective memory goals, provides a handout that lists the goals, and instructs the participant to try to complete them as intended. Of note, even this minimal level of discussion of real-life cognitive tasks is not typical of process training interventions, but we include it to control for that which is occurring in the strategy training group.

Participants in this group do not attend any sessions during the time the other groups are participating in the Strategy or Process Training