| Cognition (Latin: cognoscere, “to know”) is the scientific term for “the process of thought”. In psychology it usually refers to an information processing view of an individual’s psychological functions; processes such as memory, association, concept formation, language, perception and problem solving. Cognitive neuroscience is an academic field concerned with the scientific study of biological substrates underlying cognition, with a specific focus on the neural substrates of mental processes.
Cognitive testing is a way of assessing the cognitive capabilities of a person and many different cognitive tests have been designed to assess different areas of cognition.
Some examples from the CANTAB® battery
 The Reaction Time task is designed to measure reaction time – both simple, where the participant responds to a single stimulus on the screen, and 5-choice, where the participant responds to a stimulus that may appear in one of five possible locations. This task is sensitive to changes in the prefrontal cortex and to many pharmacological manipulations, particularly in patients with cholinergic dysfunction.
 Delayed Match to Sample is a test of memory over different times – the participant has to match a pattern from a choice of four patterns, which initially are displayed simultaneously, then delays of 0, 4 and 12 seconds are introduced. This task is sensitive to changes in the medial temporal lobes (particularly the hippocampus) and frontal lobes, with neuroimaging studies showing increased activation in occipital and parietal cortices during shorter delays, and temporal and ventrolateral frontal cortices during longer delays.
 In the Paired Associates Learning task, the participant must remember the location of patterns in boxes that open up on the screen. Initially one or two of six boxes contain patterns and the task is easy; as more boxes are filled with patterns the task of remembering which pattern goes in which box becomes more challenging. Successful performance of the PAL test is dependent on functional integrity of the temporal lobe, particularly the entorhinal cortex. Patients with Alzheimer’s disease show a marked deficit on this test, which predates the onset of gross cognitive decline.
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