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General information about cognitive treatments

What are Cognition-Oriented Treatments?

Cognition-oriented treatments, called COTs for short, are treatments that focus on how we think. The goal is to improve our brain’s performance when we do something, like making decisions, learning, or trying to remember a detail. COTs can focus on any aspect of how we think, and can be used to help those who have difficulties functioning in their daily life or those who don’t.

Some forms of COTs are cognitive training, cognitive rehabilitation and cognitive stimulation.

What is Cognitive Training?

Cognitive training, or CT for short, is a type of COTs. Also called brain training, retraining, or remediation, it refers to a set of activities that train your brain on general abilities like memory, attention, or problem-solving. Sometimes, the training can even involve daily life activities like online shopping or setting up a dinner table. By practising these tasks, you can improve your brain’s processing, or help maintain it if you are experiencing cognitive decline. Another important aspect of CT is that practice in one area will help another area if they rely on the same basic abilities. This is especially important for people with dementia. Today, many CT programs are done on the computer.

What is Cognitive Rehabilitation?

Cognitive rehabilitation involves programs specially designed for an individual's specific goals. It has a focus on helping people improve their performance in specific activities of daily living, depending on their needs. For example, personalised education depending on needs, training on how to use memory tools and help with strategies for performing everyday tasks.

What is Cognitive Stimulation?

Cognitive stimulation involves activities or exercises designed to be mentally-engaging and challenge thinking abilities. Cognitive stimulation is more broad and less structured than CT. Some common cognitive stimulating activities include crosswords, puzzles and strategy games.