Cogmed

History

In 1999, cognitive neuroscience professor Torkel Klingberg proposed a computer training program designed to improve working memory in children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The resulting program, today named the Cogmed Working Memory Training, is based on the concept of neuroplasticity, the idea that it is possible to produce physical changes in the brain through behavioural or environmental influence.

Following early testing based on Klingberg's research, Cogmed was founded in 2001 at the Karolinska Institutet in Stockholm. Reported initial results were promising, particularly Klingberg's finding that after five weeks of training, 12 of the 20 unmedicated ADHD children tested no longer met the clinical criteria for ADHD.

The sale and use of Cogmed training on Europe and the United States continued. This growth included expansion into treatment for other impairments of working memory, such as persons with learning disabilities, and victims of stroke or other traumatic brain injury.

In 2010, Cogmed was purchased by Pearson Education and became a part of the Pearson Clinical Assessment Group.

Reception

Cogmed's products are designed to impact working memory, which some studies have shown is both key to attention and learning, and is commonly impaired in individuals with ADHD. The company claims that its training produces long-term improvements in working memory, resulting in reduced cognitive failures in daily life as well as lasting behavioural outcomes. However, there is no agreement in the research community on whether these claims can be substantiated. Some researchers question whether the benefits of training can be generalized to everyday tasks and retained over the long term. A meta-analysis of 23 research studies on seven different commercial and non-commercial working memory training techniques (including Cogmed) found that "working memory training programs give only near-transfer effects, and there is no convincing evidence that even such near-transfer effects are durable." Another review of Cogmed argued that many of the problem-solving or training tasks presented in Cogmed are not related to working memory, that many of the attention tasks are unrelated to ADHD, and that there is limited transfer to real-life manifestations of attention deficits, concluding "The only unequivocal statement that can be made is that Cogmed will improve performance on tasks that resemble Cogmed training."

The company is generally more positively received in popular media, receiving attention both for their business growth and for the training program itself. Other press is less favourable, including a 2013 The New Yorker magazine article flatly stating that brain training games are "bogus."