Exercise for Brain Health in Older African Americans
This study is looking at how different types of exercise affect brain health and the risk of Alzheimer's disease in older African Americans. You could join if you are 60 or older, identify as African American or Black, and are able to walk on your own. The study is testing two types of exercise: Cardio-Dance Fitness (aerobic dancing) and Strength, Flexibility & Balance (non-aerobic exercises). Researchers want to see if these exercises improve your ability to apply past learning to new situations (generalization) and change how your brain networks connect (neural flexibility). The study aims to enroll 280 participants, but its current recruitment status is unclear.
- Study design
- This interventional study plans to enroll 280 participants to compare two different exercise programs.
- What's involved
- Participants will attend exercise classes three times a week for about 60 minutes per session, over 24 weeks (approximately 6 months).
- Compensation
- Not stated in the trial record.
- Follow-up
- Researchers will measure changes from when you start the study to six months later.
AI-generated from the public study record. Only the study team can confirm whether you're eligible — confirm details with them before making decisions.
Exercise to Improve Brain Health in Older African Americans
At a glance
Conditions
Where it's being run
1 sites across 1 statesStudy leadership
- Mark A. Gluck, PhD · PRINCIPAL_INVESTIGATOR · Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey - Newark campus
Who to contact
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Do you actually qualify for this trial?
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Inclusion
Exclusion
What this trial measures
- Generalization Performance on the Concurrent Discrimination and Transfer TaskChanges from baseline to six months
The Concurrent Discrimination and Transfer Task (a task that indexes generalization, the ability to apply past learning to novel task demands) will be administered at baseline, and then following the intervention (6-months). The main outcome from this task is the number transfer errors. A higher score indicates worse generalization.
- Generalization Performance on the Acquired Equivalence TaskChanges from baseline to six months
The Acquired Equivalence Task (a task that indexes generalization, the ability to apply past learning to novel task demands) will be administered at baseline, and then following the intervention (6-months). The main outcome from this task is generalization accuracy. A higher score indicates better generalization.
- Medial Temporal Lobe Neural FlexibilityChanges from baseline to six months
Medial Temporal Lobe Neural Flexibility is a measure of synchrony via fMRI resting-state analyses in the hippocampus and other medial temporal lobe brain regions for encoding new memories. Flexibility is quantified as the number of times a node displayed a change in community assignment, normalized by the total possible number of changes; this will be computed for each of our seven regions of interest in the medial temporal lobe. A higher score indicates greater flexibility. The flexibility of the MTL network as a whole was then computed as the mean flexibility over all nodes.