TY - JOUR

T1 - When Testing Becomes Learning—Underscoring the Relevance of Habituation to Improve Internal Validity of Common Neurocognitive Tests

AU - Warneke, Konstantin

AU - Oraže, Manuel

AU - Plöschberger, Gerit

AU - Herbsleb, Marco

AU - Afonso, Jose

AU - Wallot, Sebastian

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2025 The Author(s). European Journal of Neuroscience published by Federation of European Neuroscience Societies and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.

PY - 2025/4

Y1 - 2025/4

N2 - Testing neurocognitive function is receiving growing attention in psychological and physical health research. To counteract the costs, reduced accessibility, and complexity of brain imaging (e.g., CT scans and fMRI) or function tests, neurocognitive performance tests (e.g., the Stroop test, the Trail Making Test, or the Choice Reaction Task) are commonly implemented. Although reliability is considered paramount when interpreting intervention effects, a detailed quantification of systematic and random errors is scarce. By recruiting 68 healthy participants from different age groups (7–64 years), we quantified population-specific measurement errors in the aforementioned neurocognitive tasks. The goal was to raise awareness about the impact of learning effects on reliability assessments and their interpretation. By performing five testing sessions with two trials per day, we observed significant learning effects from repeated testing. Trial-to-trial improvements of up to 50% were measured, accompanied by a random measurement error reduction from day to day. These learning effects were task and population specific, highlighting the need for caution when transferring reliability coefficients from other studies. The quantification of systematic and random measurement errors underscores the importance of conducting sufficient habituation sessions in neurocognitive tasks, as test protocols lack validity if they do not ensure reliability. Therefore, sufficient habituation sessions (i.e., until no meaningful learning effects can be observed) may be warranted when testing is repeated within short timeframes.

AB - Testing neurocognitive function is receiving growing attention in psychological and physical health research. To counteract the costs, reduced accessibility, and complexity of brain imaging (e.g., CT scans and fMRI) or function tests, neurocognitive performance tests (e.g., the Stroop test, the Trail Making Test, or the Choice Reaction Task) are commonly implemented. Although reliability is considered paramount when interpreting intervention effects, a detailed quantification of systematic and random errors is scarce. By recruiting 68 healthy participants from different age groups (7–64 years), we quantified population-specific measurement errors in the aforementioned neurocognitive tasks. The goal was to raise awareness about the impact of learning effects on reliability assessments and their interpretation. By performing five testing sessions with two trials per day, we observed significant learning effects from repeated testing. Trial-to-trial improvements of up to 50% were measured, accompanied by a random measurement error reduction from day to day. These learning effects were task and population specific, highlighting the need for caution when transferring reliability coefficients from other studies. The quantification of systematic and random measurement errors underscores the importance of conducting sufficient habituation sessions in neurocognitive tasks, as test protocols lack validity if they do not ensure reliability. Therefore, sufficient habituation sessions (i.e., until no meaningful learning effects can be observed) may be warranted when testing is repeated within short timeframes.

KW - learning effects

KW - Neurocognition

KW - psychological measurement

KW - repeatability

KW - systematic testing error

KW - Psychology

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=105003553135&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1111/ejn.70117

DO - 10.1111/ejn.70117

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 40275720

AN - SCOPUS:105003553135

VL - 61

JO - European Journal of Neuroscience

JF - European Journal of Neuroscience

SN - 0953-816X

IS - 8

M1 - e70117

ER -