The Impact of UCMAS Training Program on Potentiating Cognitive Capacity among 9-12 Year-Old Primary Schoolers in Shiraz

Ali-Mohammad Kamali; Fatemeh Shamsi; Zahra Zeraatpisheh; Mohammad-Mojtaba Kamelmanesh; Mohammad Nami

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arXiv · 1904.07589

The Impact of UCMAS Training Program on Potentiating Cognitive Capacity among 9-12 Year-Old Primary Schoolers in Shiraz

Ali-Mohammad Kamali·Fatemeh Shamsi·Zahra Zeraatpisheh·Mohammad-Mojtaba Kamelmanesh·Mohammad Nami

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Abstract

The Universal Concept of Mental Arithmetic System (UCMAS) is a modern representation of an ancient art of mental arithmetic. Although such a training is hypothesized to result in potential effects on mental capacity and cognitive performance in experienced trainees, this has not sufficiently been systematically studied. The present study was an attempt to compare the objective testing score of Less-trained (less than 6 months of training) and experienced (over 36 months of training) UCMAS-trained young adolescents in Shiraz. Thirty healthy participants aged 9-12 were recruited from UCMAS training centers in Shiraz. The two study arms (comprising 15 less-trained and 15 experienced children) were ensured to be sex- and age-matched. The Cambridge Brain Science-Cognitive Platform (CBS-CP) was employed as a media-rich computer testing battery for cognitive assessments. Moreover, cerebral blood levels of the participants was recorded through Hemoencephalography upon taking CBS-CP tasks (ANI task of each participant).The experienced UCMAS-trained participants were found to outperform in the Spatial Span (p=0.004), Digit Span (p=0.014) and Monkey Ladder (P=0.022) tests in which Short-Term Memory and Visuo-Constructive skills play important roles. Nevertheless, our findings revealed no statistically significant difference between-group differences in test scores which measured other cognitive domains. Adding to the existing body of evidence on the effect of UCMAS training on potentiating cognitive capacity, our findings suggest that experienced UCMAS trainees tend to outperform in some key cognitive domains including Short-Term Memory and Visuo-Constructive Capacity. Further experimental neuroscience studies using quantitative electroencephalography and functional magnetic- or optic-neuroimaging would shed further light to neurodynamics of such a differentiation.

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Ali-Mohammad Kamali, Fatemeh Shamsi, Zahra Zeraatpisheh, Mohammad-Mojtaba Kamelmanesh, Mohammad Nami. 2019-04-16. The Impact of UCMAS Training Program on Potentiating Cognitive Capacity among 9-12 Year-Old Primary Schoolers in Shiraz. https://arxiv.org/abs/1904.07589

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