title: Cognitive procedural learning among children and adolescents with or without spastic cerebral palsy: the differential effect of age.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Children learn to engage their surroundings skillfully, adopting implicit knowledge of complex regularities and associations. Probabilistic classification learning (PCL) is a type of cognitive procedural learning in which different cues are probabilistically associated with specific outcomes. Little is known about the effects of developmental disorders on cognitive skill acquisition.
  
  
  METHODS
  Twenty-four children and adolescents with cerebral palsy (CP) were compared to 24 typically developing (TD) youth in their ability to learn probabilistic associations. Performance was examined in relation to general cognitive abilities, level of motor impairment and age.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Improvement in PCL was observed for all participants, with no relation to IQ. An age effect was found only among TD children.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Learning curves of children with CP on a cognitive procedural learning task differ from those of TD peers and do not appear to be age sensitive.
authors.affiliation: The Department of Psychology, Bar Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 52900, Israel. Electronic address: mgoferlevi@gmail.com.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gofer-Levi
authors.affiliation: The Department of Psychology, Bar Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 52900, Israel; The Edmond and Lily Safra Children's Hospital, Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer 52621, Israel. Electronic address: tamarsilberg@gmail.com.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Silberg
authors.affiliation: The Edmond and Lily Safra Children's Hospital, Chaim Sheba Medical Center, Tel-Hashomer 52621, Israel. Electronic address: amichai.brezner@sheba.health.gov.il.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Brezner
authors.affiliation: The Department of Psychology, Bar Ilan University, Ramat-Gan 52900, Israel. Electronic address: eli.vakil@biu.ac.il.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Vakil
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D041923:Adolescent Development / Q000502:physiology*; D000367:Age Factors; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D002547:Cerebral Palsy / Q000523:psychology*; D002648:Child; D002657:Child Development / Q000502:physiology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007858:Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D011337:Probability Learning; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Cerebral palsy (CP); Cognitive procedural learning; Developmental effect; Probabilistic classification learning (PCL)