Dissociating Semantic and Phonological Verbal Fluency

Total Page:16

File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb

Load more

Dissociating Semantic and Phonological Verbal Fluency Inaugural - Dissertation zur Erlangung der Doktorwürde der Wirtschafts - und Verhaltenswissenschaftlichen Fakultät der Albert - Ludwigs - Universität Freiburg i. Br. vorgelegt von Charlotte Sophie Schmidt geboren in Dortmund Sommersemester 2018 Dekan: Prof. Dr. Alexander Renkl , Albert - Ludwigs - Universität Freiburg Erstgutachter: Prof. Dr. Markus Heinrichs, Albert - Ludwigs - Universität Freiburg Zweitgutachter: PD Dr. Joseph Krummenacher, Albert - Ludwigs - Universität Freiburg Betreuer: Dr. Christoph P. Kaller, Dipl. - Psych., Universitätsklinikum Freiburg Datum der Disputat ion: 16. November 2018 Acknowledgments Several people have supported me during the completion of this doctoral thesis and I would like to thank everyone who contributed . First of all , my special thanks go to Dr. Christoph Kaller for his close supervision . I am grateful for the amount of time he spent discussing new ideas and open questions with me and for his patience with my w ork. Furthermore, I would like to thank Prof. Heinrichs and Dr. Krummenacher for being my doctorate supervisor s . Many thanks to my colleagues Lena Schumacher, Konrad Schumac her, Kai Nitschke , Sandra Loosli , and Lora Minkova and all people from the Freiburg Brain Imaging Center who helped me with valuable comments and who cre ated a good working atmosphere. In addition, I would like to thank my friends from the University Sports - Club Freiburg who helped me refuel my energy after a long day at work . A big thank you to all the participants, patients , and their families who volunteered to take part in my studies. Without their support it would not have been possible to presen t my results as I am doing now. Furthermore, I would like to thank my family and friends who al ways gave me courage in the comple tion of my thesis . Last but not least my special thanks go to my boyfriend Florian, who supported me the most during the last years and always had a bite of chocolate in strenuous times . Thank you all ! iii Abstract Semantic and phonological verbal fluency tasks, that require the examinee to produce words to a given semantic (i.e. category) or phonological (i.e. letter) cue, are often used in clinical and experimental neuropsychology to assess language abilities and executive functioning. As in the two task variants word generation is believed to involve different types of search processes, it is also implicitly assumed that semantic and phonological verbal fluency differ both in their u nderlying cognitive processes and neural correlates involved for successful retrieval. However, in previously published factor analyses, semantic and phonological verbal fluency loaded on only one common factor. Moreover, the often assumed double dissociat ion between lesions in temporal vs. frontal brain regions and impairments in semantic vs. phonological verbal fluency was neither explicitly tested nor shown. By using exploratory factor analyses in healthy participants and further confirmatory factor anal yses in chronic stroke patients with measures of semantic and phonological verbal fluency only, the first study of this thesis showed that inter - individual differences in semantic and phonological verbal fluency are represented by two factors. These two fa ctors show both common and distinct shares of variance and can therefore be interpreted as evidence for the involvement of both distinct and common cognitive processes. The second study of this thesis used voxel - based lesion - behavior mapping analyses in ch ronic stroke patients and results revealed that a specific impairment in semantic vs. phonological verbal fluency resulted from lesions in temporal vs. frontal brain regions, respectively. Further analyses showed that a specific impairment depends on the e xact localization, especially for lesions in frontal brain areas and that semantic and phonological verbal fluency may be impaired to a similar extent. In order to confirm the clinical utility of the German version of the verbal fluency task, applied in th e previous studies, the third study was concerned with its psychometric properties v by taking particularly the impact of item difficulty into account. Results indicate good test - score reliability, criterion - related concurrent validity, and test - retest relia bility, and reliability clearly benefits from aggregation across multiple items. Overall results demonstrate that semantic and phonological fluency are based on clearly distinct but also common sets of cognitive processes and that they are differentially m ediated by temporal and frontal brain areas, respectively. Furthermore, for a reliable assessment of verbal fluency, item difficulty should be considered. Taken together, this thesis contributes to a more comprehensive understanding of verbal fluency and i ts underlying cognitive and neural correlates. vi Zusammenfassung Aufgaben zur semantischen und phonologischen Wortflüssigkeit, bei denen Wörter zu vorgegebenen semantischen (i.e. Kategorien) und phonologischen (i.e. Buchstaben) Aufgaben gesagt werden müssen, werden in der klinischen und experimentellen Neuropsychologie häufig zur Erfassung sprachlicher und exekutiver Leistungen eingesetzt. Da man davon ausgeht, dass die Wortgenerierung bei den bei den Aufgabenvarianten von unterschiedlichen Suchprozessen abhängt, wird auch implizit angenommen, dass sich die semantische und phonologische Wortflüssigkeit sowohl in ihren zugrundeliegenden kognitiven Prozessen als auch beteiligten neuralen Korrelaten un terscheiden. Bisher veröffentlichte Faktoranalysen zeigen jedoch, dass Aufgaben zur semantischen und phonologischen Wortflüssigkeit auf nur einem gemeinsamen Faktor laden. Die oft angenommene doppelte Dissoziation zwi schen Läsionen in temporalen vs. fronta len Hirnarealen und semantischer vs. phonologischer Wortflüssigkeit wurde bislang weder explicit getestet noch aufgezeigt. Unter Verwendung explorativer Faktoranalysen in gesunden Probanden und weiterführenden konfirmatorischen Faktoranalysen in chronische n Schlaganfallpatienten, zeigt die erste Studie dieser Arbeit, dass inter - individuelle Unterschiede in semantischer und phonologischer Wortflüssigkeit durch zwei Faktoren abgebildet werden. Die beiden Faktoren zeigen zudem getrennte als auch gemeinsame Var ianzanteile, was als Hinweis auf die Beteiligung unterschiedlicher und auch gemeinsamer kognitiver Prozesse interpretiert werden kann. Die zweite Studie dieser Arbeit verwendet voxel - basierte Läsions - Verhalten Analysen mit Daten chronischer Schlaganfallpa tienten und die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass eine spezifische Beeinträchtigung in semantischer vs. phonologischer Wortflüssigkeit mit Läsionen in links temporalen beziehungsweise links frontalen Hirnarealen einhergeht. Weitere Analysen zeigen, dass die Spezifit ät der Beeinträchtigung, insbesondere bei Läsionen in frontalen vii Hirnarealen, lokalisationsabhängig ist und die semantische und phonologische Wortflüssigkeit auch gleichermaßen beeinträchtigt sein kann. Um den klinischen Nutzen dieser deutschen Version zur Wortflüssigkeit, die in den vorherigen Studien verwendet wurde, zu bestärken, beschäftigt sich die dritte Studie mit seinen psychometrischen Eigenschaften, wobei der Einfluss der Aufgabenschwierigkeit besonders berücksichtigt wurde. Die Ergebnisse zeigen e ine gute Testergebnis - Reliabilität, Konstruktvalidität und Test - Retest Reliabilität. Zudem profitiert die Reliabilität eindeutig von der Aggregation über mehrere Aufgaben hinweg. Insgesamt zeigen die Ergebnisse, dass semantische und phonologische Fluenz auf klar unterschiedlichen aber auch gemeinsamen kognitiven Prozessen basieren und dass sie durch unterschiedliche Regionen im Temporal - beziehungsweise Frontallappen vermittelt werden. Für eine zuverlässige Beurteilung der Reliabilität sollte zudem die Au fgabenschwierigkeit mit berücksichtigt werden. Zusammenfassend trägt diese Arbeit zu einem umfangreicheren Verständnis der Wortflüssigkeit und ihren zugrunde liegenden kognitiven und neuralen Korrelaten bei. viii Content Acknowledgments ................................ ................................ ................................ ..................... iii Abstract ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ...... v Zusammenfassung ................................ ................................ ................................ .................... vii Content ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ ...... ix List of Figures ................................ ................................ ................................ ........................... xi List of Tables ................................ ................................ ................................ ........................... xiii List of Abbrevia tions ................................ ................................ ................................ ............... xiv Chapter 1 ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ .. 17 Introduction ................................ ................................ ................................ .......................... 17 Chapter 2 ................................ ................................ ................................ ................................ .. 21 Theoretical Background
Recommended publications
  • Verbal Fluency Performance After Traumatic Brain Injury: a Cluster Analysis

    Verbal Fluency Performance After Traumatic Brain Injury: a Cluster Analysis

    Verbal Fluency Performance after Traumatic Brain Injury: A Cluster Analysis A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Michael James Peterson IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS Dr. Mary R. T. Kennedy October 2011 © Michael Peterson October 2011 i Acknowledgements I’d like to acknowledge the support of Dr. Mary R. T. Kennedy for her invaluable advice and feedback during the completion of this project. I would also like to acknowledge the assistance of Miriam Krause, Shelley Johnson, and Jaclyn Benkofske. ii Dedication This thesis/project is dedicated to my parents James and Gail Peterson. iii Abstract This study examines the sensitivity of two different analyses for comparing verbal fluency test performance of participants with mild cognitive impairment resulting from traumatic brain injury (TBI) and healthy controls. The study uses a cluster analysis based on Troyer, Moscovitch, and Winocur (1997) of switching and clustering for the first time in a TBI-only sample. The sensitivity of number of correct words produced, a standard measure of verbal fluency performance, is also examined. The effects of demographic variables of education and estimated verbal IQ are reported. Participants included 31 adults with TBI and 26 adult controls. Significant group differences were found in estimated verbal IQ. Number of correct words produced was no more sensitive for detecting group differences in verbal fluency performance than total responses (correct and incorrect) in letter and category fluency conditions, but may be more sensitive in category switching. No group differences were found in any cluster analysis measure when estimated verbal IQ and total responses were controlled.
  • Word Fluency in Typically Developing Malayalam Speaking Children

    Word Fluency in Typically Developing Malayalam Speaking Children

    International Journal of Health Sciences and Research www.ijhsr.org ISSN: 2249-9571 Original Research Article Word Fluency in Typically Developing Malayalam Speaking Children Nisha Melempatt Lohithakshan1, Nuggehalli Puttaveeraiah Nataraja2 1Ph.D. Research Fellow, 2Director & Professor, Department of Audiology and Speech Language Pathology, J.S.S. Institute of Speech and Hearing, J.S.S. Research Foundation, Musuru, Karnataka, India Corresponding Author: Nisha Melempatt Lohithakshan ABSTRACT Word fluency or verbal fluency is the ability to form and express words that are attuned with the required criteria. The test of word fluency assesses verbal functioning using two tasks i.e., category fluency or semantic fluency task (SF) and letter fluency or phonemic fluency task (PF). The performance of these tasks is related to vocabulary size and speed of lexical access which are directly related to the learning process. The present study aimed at assessing the word fluency in 5-14 year old typically developing Malayalam speaking children and the objectives were (1). To assess the word fluency in terms of semantic fluency and phonemic fluency in typically developing Malayalam speaking children across age and gender. (2).To compare the performance of typically developing Malayalam speaking children in both semantic fluency and phonemic fluency tasks across the age and the gender. The study included 600 typically developing children in the age range of 5-14 years. A cross-sectional research design was used to assess the semantic fluency and phonemic fluency. The results of the study revealed that there were distinct patterns of continuous and linear developmental trend in word fluency. The outcome of the study has also revealed a positive influence of age and gender on the word fluency.
  • Performance Difference in Verbal Fluency in Bilingual and Monolingual Speakers

    Performance Difference in Verbal Fluency in Bilingual and Monolingual Speakers

    Performance difference in verbal fluency in bilingual and monolingual speakers Article Published Version Creative Commons: Attribution 4.0 (CC-BY) Open Access Patra, A., Bose, A. and Marinis, T. (2020) Performance difference in verbal fluency in bilingual and monolingual speakers. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 23 (1). pp. 204-218. ISSN 1469-1841 doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918001098 Available at http://centaur.reading.ac.uk/80727/ It is advisable to refer to the publisher’s version if you intend to cite from the work. See Guidance on citing . To link to this article DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918001098 Publisher: Cambridge University Press All outputs in CentAUR are protected by Intellectual Property Rights law, including copyright law. Copyright and IPR is retained by the creators or other copyright holders. Terms and conditions for use of this material are defined in the End User Agreement . www.reading.ac.uk/centaur CentAUR Central Archive at the University of Reading Reading’s research outputs online Bilingualism: Language and Performance difference in verbal fluency in Cognition bilingual and monolingual speakers cambridge.org/bil Abhijeet Patra1, Arpita Bose1 and Theodoros Marinis1,2 1School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, UK and 2Department of Linguistics, University of Konstanz, Germany Research Article Cite this article: Patra A, Bose A, Marinis T Abstract (2019). Performance difference in verbal Research has shown that bilinguals can perform similarly, better or poorly on verbal fluency fluency in bilingual and monolingual speakers. task compared to monolinguals. Verbal fluency data for semantic (animals, fruits and vege- Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 1–15.
  • Analysis of Verbal Fluency Output on Semantic Categories of 'Food' and 'Vehicle' in Typically Developing Malayalam Speak

    Analysis of Verbal Fluency Output on Semantic Categories of 'Food' and 'Vehicle' in Typically Developing Malayalam Speak

    Psychology of Language and Communication 2018, Vol. 22, No. 1 DOI: 10.2478/plc-2018-0015 SUNILA JOHN, BELLUR RAJASHEKHAR, VASUDEVA GUDDATTU Manipal Academy of Higher Education, Manipal, India ANALYSIS OF VERBAL FLUENCY OUTPUT ON SEMANTIC CATEGORIES OF ‘FOOD’ AND ‘VEHICLE’ IN TYPICALLY DEVELOPING MALAYALAM SPEAKING CHILDREN In the wake of limited knowledge on verbal fluency performance in typically developing children, the present study aims at investigating the semantic fluency performance of Malayalam speaking children across age, gender and tasks. Using a cross-sectional study design, semantic fluency performance (on food and vehicle fluency tasks) was investigated in 1015 Malayalam speaking typically developing children aged 5 to 15 years. The findings revealed the positive influence of age and task with no substantial difference between gender groups, with good inter-rater and intra-rater reliability. The study outcomes depicted a distinct pattern of continuous and linear developmental trend in organizational strategies, with no specific age band showing any dramatic increase in performance. Semantic fluency as a task has great potential within the developmental context for understanding the highly language, culture, and task based word retrieval mechanism. Key words:semantic fluency; typically developing children; Malayalam language; vehicle fluency; food fluency Introduction The ability to generate words with speed and accuracy is one of the crucial elements of spoken word production. Successful generation of words involves accessing one’s own vocabulary repertoire or mental lexicon and retrieving the words specific to the target from stored word knowledge. Verbal fluency (also known as word generation task / word list generation task / word fluency test / controlled oral word association / controlled verbal fluency test / controlled Address for correspondence:Sunila John, Department of Speech & Hearing, School of Allied Health Sciences, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, 576104 Manipal, India.
  • Predictors of Verbal Fluency Performance in Older Adults

    Predictors of Verbal Fluency Performance in Older Adults

    Language Sciences What do verbal fluency tasks measure? Predictors of verbal fluency performance in older adults Zeshu Shao, Esther Janse, Karina Visser and Antje Meyer Journal Name: Frontiers in Psychology ISSN: 1664-1078 Article type: Original Research Article Received on: 12 Mar 2014 Accepted on: 01 Jul 2014 Provisional PDF published on: 01 Jul 2014 www.frontiersin.org: www.frontiersin.org Citation: Shao Z, Janse E, Visser K and Meyer A(2014) What do verbal fluency tasks measure? Predictors of verbal fluency performance in older adults. Front. Psychol. 5:772. doi:10.3389/fpsyg.2014.00772 Copyright statement: © 2014 Shao, Janse, Visser and Meyer. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. This Provisional PDF corresponds to the article as it appeared upon acceptance, after rigorous peer-review. Fully formatted PDF and full text (HTML) versions will be made available soon. PREDICTORS OF VERBAL FLUENCY PERFORMANCE 1 Running head: PREDICTORS OF VERBAL FLUENCY PERFORMANCE What do verbal fluency tasks measure? Predictors of verbal fluency performance in older adults Zeshu Shao, Esther Janse, Karina Visser, Antje S. Meyer Authors and affiliations Zeshu Shao*, Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, the Netherlands Esther Janse, Centre for Language Studies, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands; Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, the Netherlands; Donders Institute for Brain, Cognition and Behaviour, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands Karina Visser, Centre for Language Studies, Radboud University, Nijmegen, the Netherlands Antje S.
  • Contrasting Two Verbal Fluency Scoring Systems Using the Rasch Rating Scale Model

    Contrasting Two Verbal Fluency Scoring Systems Using the Rasch Rating Scale Model

    Actualidades en Psicología, 32(124), 2018, 65-74 ISSN 2215-3535 http://revistas.ucr.ac.cr/index.php/actualidades DOI: https://doi.org/10.15517/ap.v32i124.31837 Contrasting Two Verbal Fluency Scoring Systems Using the Rasch Rating Scale Model Comparación de Dos Sistemas de Puntuación de la Fluidez Verbal Mediante el Modelo de Escalas de Calificación Gerardo Prieto1 Ana R. Delgado2 M.Victoria Perea3 Ricardo García4 Valentina Ladera5 University of Salamanca, Spain Abstract.Objective: Two scoring systems for a verbal fluency test were compared using the Rasch Rating Scale Model. Method: The analysis was carried out on 289 participants, 92 of whom had had a Parkinson’s disease diagnosis. Scores were calculated with two different category systems: a conventional procedure and a percentile-based one. Results: The percentile-based Rasch scores produce adequate categories and reliable measures, while the correlation with the Mini Mental State Examination evinces concurrent validity. After statistically controlling for age, percentile-based Rasch measures discriminated between both groups, demonstrating predictive validity. Conclusions: The analysis of the two procedures allows for the recommendation of the use of percentile-based categories. Keywords. Neuropsychological assessment, parkinson’s disease, verbal fluency, Rasch Rating Scale Model. Resumen. Objetivo: Comparar dos sistemas de puntuación para un test de fluidez verbal con el Modelo de Escalas de Calificación. Método: Se analizaron datos de 289 participantes, de los cuales 92 habían sido diagnosticados con Parkinson. Las puntuaciones se calcularon con dos sistemas de categorización: un procedimiento convencional y otro basado en percentiles. Resultados: Las puntuaciones Rasch procedentes de percentiles dan lugar a categorías adecuadas y medidas fiables; la correlación con las puntuaciones del test Minimental es evidencia de validez concurrente.
  • Components of Executive Function Predict Regional Prefrontal Volumes

    Components of Executive Function Predict Regional Prefrontal Volumes

    bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/374009; this version posted July 22, 2018. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity. It is made available under Running head: EF COMPONENTSaCC-BY-NC-ND PREDICT 4.0 PREFRONTAL International license. VOLUME 1 Components of Executive Function Predict Regional Prefrontal Volumes Ryan A. Mace, [email protected], 410-917-8239 a Abigail B. Waters, [email protected], 703-975-3449 a Kayle S. Sawyer, [email protected], 617-875-5967 b,c,d,e Taylor Turrisi, [email protected], 857-218-5061 f David A. Gansler, Corresponding author, [email protected], 617-305-6397 a a. Department of Psychology, Suffolk University, Boston, MA, USA b. VA Boston Healthcare System, Boston, MA, USA c. Department of Anatomy & Neurobiology, Boston University School of Medicine, Boston, MA, USA d. Athinoula A. Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard University, Charlestown, MA, USA e. Sawyer Scientific, LLC, Boston, MA, USA f. Division of Pain Medicine, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Boston Children’s Hospital Acknowledgement: The authors thank the NKI-Rockland Sample Initiative for collecting and providing the data used in these analyses. Conflicts of Interest: The authors declare that they have no conflicting interests. Counts: abstract (250); text (5615) references (110); tables (4); figures (1); pages (44) bioRxiv preprint doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/374009; this version posted July 22, 2018. The copyright holder for this preprint (which was not certified by peer review) is the author/funder, who has granted bioRxiv a license to display the preprint in perpetuity.
  • Proficiency and Control in Verbal Fluency Performance Across the Lifespan for Monolinguals and Bilinguals

    Proficiency and Control in Verbal Fluency Performance Across the Lifespan for Monolinguals and Bilinguals

    Proficiency and control in verbal fluency performance across the lifespan for monolinguals and bilinguals The Harvard community has made this article openly available. Please share how this access benefits you. Your story matters Citation Friesen, Deanna C., Lin Luo, Gigi Luk, and Ellen Bialystok. 2013. “Proficiency and Control in Verbal Fluency Performance Across the Lifespan for Monolinguals and Bilinguals.” Language, Cognition and Neuroscience 30 (3) (November 18): 238–250. Published Version doi:10.1080/23273798.2014.918630 Citable link http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:17533669 Terms of Use This article was downloaded from Harvard University’s DASH repository, and is made available under the terms and conditions applicable to Open Access Policy Articles, as set forth at http:// nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:dash.current.terms-of- use#OAP Running head: PROFICIENCY AND CONTROL IN VERBAL FLUENCY Proficiency and Control in Verbal Fluency Performance across the Lifespan for Monolinguals and Bilinguals Deanna C. Friesen1, Lin Luo1, Gigi Luk2, & Ellen Bialystok1 1. York University 2. Harvard University Address for Correspondence: Ellen Bialystok Department of Psychology York University 4700 Keele Street Toronto, Ontario M3J 1P3 Canada Email: [email protected] Authors’ Note The research reported in this paper was funded by grant R01HD052523 from the US National Institutes of Health and grant A2559 from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to EB. 2 Abstract The verbal fluency task is a widely used neuropsychological test of word retrieval efficiency. Both category fluency (e.g., list animals) and letter fluency (e.g., list words that begin with F) place demands on semantic memory and executive control functions.
  • Semantic Loss Marks Early Alzheimer's Disease-Related

    Semantic Loss Marks Early Alzheimer's Disease-Related

    Semantic loss marks early Alzheimer’s disease-related neurodegeneration in older adults without dementia J. M. J. Vonk, Vincent Bouteloup, J. F. Mangin, B. Dubois, F. Blanc, A. Gabelle, Mathieu Ceccaldi, Cédric Annweiler, P. Krolak-Salmon, C. Belin, et al. To cite this version: J. M. J. Vonk, Vincent Bouteloup, J. F. Mangin, B. Dubois, F. Blanc, et al.. Semantic loss marks early Alzheimer’s disease-related neurodegeneration in older adults without dementia. Alzheimer’s & Dementia: Diagnosis, Assessment & Disease Monitoring, Wiley, 2020, 12 (1), pp.1- 14. 10.1002/dad2.12066. hal-03148797 HAL Id: hal-03148797 https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03148797 Submitted on 22 Feb 2021 HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est archive for the deposit and dissemination of sci- destinée au dépôt et à la diffusion de documents entific research documents, whether they are pub- scientifiques de niveau recherche, publiés ou non, lished or not. The documents may come from émanant des établissements d’enseignement et de teaching and research institutions in France or recherche français ou étrangers, des laboratoires abroad, or from public or private research centers. publics ou privés. Distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution| 4.0 International License Received: 9 June 2020 Accepted: 11 June 2020 Published online: 3 August 2020 DOI: 10.1002/dad2.12066 RESEARCH ARTICLE Semantic loss marks early Alzheimer’s disease-related neurodegeneration in older adults without dementia Jet M. J. Vonk1,2 Vincent Bouteloup3,4
  • Performance Difference in Verbal Fluency in Bilingual And

    Performance Difference in Verbal Fluency in Bilingual And

    Erschienen in: Bilingualism : Language and Cognition ; 23 (2020), 1. - S. 204-218 https://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1366728918001098 Bilingualism: Language and Performance difference in verbal fluency in Cognition bilingual and monolingual speakers cambridge.org/bil Abhijeet Patra1, Arpita Bose1 and Theodoros Marinis1,2 1School of Psychology and Clinical Language Sciences, University of Reading, UK and 2Department of Linguistics, University of Konstanz, Germany Research Article Cite this article: Patra A, Bose A, Marinis T Abstract (2020). Performance difference in verbal Research has shown that bilinguals can perform similarly, better or poorly on verbal fluency fluency in bilingual and monolingual speakers. task compared to monolinguals. Verbal fluency data for semantic (animals, fruits and vege- Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 23, – 204–218. https://doi.org/10.1017/ tables, and clothing) and letter fluency (F, A, S) were collected from 25 Bengali English bilin- S1366728918001098 guals and 25 English monolinguals in English. The groups were matched for receptive vocabulary, age, education and non-verbal intelligence. We used a wide range of measures Received: 15 March 2018 to characterize fluency performance: number of correct, fluency difference score, time-course Revised: 30 October 2018 analysis (1st RT, Sub-RT, initiation, slope), clustering, and switching. Participants completed Accepted: 5 November 2018 First published online: 19 February 2019 three executive control measures tapping into inhibitory control, mental-set shifting and working memory. Differences between the groups were significant when executive control Key words: demands were higher such as number of correct responses in letter fluency, fluency difference semantic fluency; letter fluency; executive score, Sub-RT, slope and cluster size for letter fluency, such that bilinguals outperform the control; inhibition; time-course analysis; Bengali monolinguals.
  • Verbal Fluency Tasks Are Often Used by Both Psycholinguists and Clinicians to Measure Lexical Access Ability

    Verbal Fluency Tasks Are Often Used by Both Psycholinguists and Clinicians to Measure Lexical Access Ability

    - 1 - Not All Verbal Fluency Tasks Are Created Equal: Lexical Access from 3 to 5 ABSTRACT Verbal fluency tasks are often used by both psycholinguists and clinicians to measure lexical access ability. These tasks have primarily been used with school-age children and adults, and the task demands and methods have varied greatly among researchers. In the current study, three-to-five year old children were given two verbal fluency tasks. On the Single Category Naming (SCN) task, children rapidly named animals. On the Multi-Category Naming (MCN) task, children named one item from each of ten categories. We also gave these children tests of vocabulary, syntax, and articulation. First, we demonstrate that scores on each task increase with age, especially between the ages of three and four. Second, we compare scores on the two tasks, finding that scores are only moderately correlated, which suggests that different verbal fluency tasks measure different abilities. Finally, we compare scores on each of the verbal fluency tasks with scores on the linguistic tasks, demonstrating that different linguistic abilities are involved in each task at different ages, which explains the lack of perfect correlation between scores on the two verbal fluency tasks. We suggest implications for choosing an appropriate verbal fluency task based on age and cognitive ability, ending with special considerations for children with developmental disabilities. INTRODUCTION In order to understand or produce a sentence, a person must not only know the pronunciation, meaning and syntactic behavior of the words that compose the sentence, but also must be able to retrieve these words efficiently and accurately (see.
  • Understanding Verbal Fluency in Healthy Aging, Alzheimer’S Disease, and Parkinson’S Disease

    Understanding Verbal Fluency in Healthy Aging, Alzheimer’S Disease, and Parkinson’S Disease

    Neuropsychology © 2011 American Psychological Association 2011, Vol. 25, No. 2, 210–225 0894-4105/11/$12.00 DOI: 10.1037/a0021531 Understanding Verbal Fluency in Healthy Aging, Alzheimer’s Disease, and Parkinson’s Disease Joan McDowd Lesa Hoffman University of Kansas Medical Center University of Nebraska-Lincoln Ellen Rozek Kelly E. Lyons, Rajesh Pahwa, and Jeffrey Burns University of Kansas University of Kansas Medical Center Susan Kemper University of Kansas Objective: Verbal fluency measures are frequently part of batteries designed to assess executive function (EF), but are also used to assess semantic processing ability or word knowledge. The goal of the present study was to identify the cognitive components underlying fluency performance. Method: Healthy young and older adults, adults with Parkinson’s disease, and adults with Alzheimer’s disease performed letter, category, and action fluency tests. Performance was assessed in terms of number of items generated, clustering, and the time course of output. A series of neuropsychological assessments were also administered to index verbal ability, working memory, EF, and processing speed as correlates of fluency performance. Results: Findings indicated that regardless of the particular performance measure, young adults performed the best and adults with Alzheimer’s disease performed most poorly, with healthy older adults and adults with Parkinson’s disease performing at intermediate levels. The exception was the action fluency task, where adults with Parkinson’s disease performed most poorly. The time course of fluency performance was characterized in terms of slope and intercept parameters and related to neuropsychological constructs. Speed of processing was found to be the best predictor of performance, rather than the efficiency of EF or semantic knowledge.