Confrontation naming deficit in dementia of depression

Unlike patients with irreversible dementia, elderly depressed patients with cognitive impairment are thought to have relatively preserved recognition, memory, and language abilities. To test this hypothesis, the authors compared memory and naming performance in elderly hospitalized patients with major depression alone, reversible dementia of depression, or irreversible dementia. All patient groups performed worse than nondemented, nondepressed control subjects on memory tasks. Patients with dementia of depression performed worse than depressed patients with normal cognition on tests of free recall, delayed recall, and verbal delayed memory but not on tests of delayed visual memory. Patients with dementia of depression and patients with irreversible dementia were severely compromised in both speed and accuracy on the confrontation naming task.     

Category-specific naming deficit in Alzheimer's disease: the effect of a display by domain interaction

A category-specific naming effect penalizing living things has often been reported in patients suffering from Alzheimer's disease (AD) and in other brain damaged populations, while the opposite dissociation (i.e., lower accuracy in naming nonliving than living things) is much rarer. In this study, we investigated whether the use of line drawings (rather than color photographs) in picture-naming tasks could be a relevant factor in the emergence of a category effect penalizing living things and found evidence in favor of this hypothesis. We administered the same naming tasks comprising living and nonliving items to 10 subjects suffering from AD and 10 normal controls. Once the stimuli were line drawings and once color photographs. A reliable Group x Semantic domain interaction, indicating a disproportionate impairment for living things in the AD group, was only found when line drawings were presented. Results are discussed with reference to two competing approaches to category-specificity in brain damaged people. One assumes that category effects are due to the differential involvement of dedicated neural subsystems, the other emphasizes the role of cross domains imbalances in processing demands. We conclude that our findings lead support to the latter approach.     

An analysis of the cognitive deficit of schizophrenia based on the Piaget developmental theory

OBJECTIVE: The objective of the study was to evaluate from the perspective of the Piaget developmental model the cognitive functioning of a sample of patients diagnosed with schizophrenia. METHOD: Fifty patients with schizophrenia (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition) and 40 healthy matched controls were evaluated by means of the Longeot Logical Thought Evaluation Scale. RESULTS: Only 6% of the subjects with schizophrenia reached the "formal period," and 70% remained at the "concrete operations" stage. The corresponding figures for the control sample were 25% and 15%, respectively. These differences were statistically significant. The samples were specifically differentiable on the permutation, probabilities, and pendulum tests of the scale. CONCLUSIONS: The Longeot Logical Thought Evaluation Scale can discriminate between subjects with schizophrenia and healthy controls.     

An electrophysiological analysis of the time course of conceptual and syntactic encoding during tacit picture naming

A central question in psycholinguistic research is when various types of information involved in speaking (conceptual/semantic, syntactic, and phonological information) become available during the speech planning process. Competing theories attempt to distinguish between parallel and serial models. Here, we investigated the relative time courses of conceptual and syntactic encoding in a tacit picture-naming task via event-related brain potential (ERP) recordings. Participants viewed pictures and made dual-choice go/no-go decisions based on conceptual features (whether the depicted item was heavier or lighter than 500 g) and syntactic features (whether the picture's German name had feminine or masculine syntactic gender). In support of serial models of speech production, both the lateralized readiness potential, or LRP (related to response preparation), and the N200 (related to response inhibition) measures indicated that conceptual processing began approximately 80 msec earlier than syntactic processing.     

The semantic deficit in aphasia: the relationship between semantic errors in auditory comprehension and picture naming

Thirty aphasic subjects were asked to point to pictures on auditory command both when the distractors came from the same semantic category as the target and when the distractors were unrelated to the target picture. The aphasics made significantly more semantic errors than non-aphasic brain-damaged controls; the incidence of semantic comprehension errors was unrelated to aphasic diagnostic groups but was related to the overall severity of aphasia. The subjects were subsequently asked to name the pictures from the comprehension task; pictures that had elicited semantic errors in comprehension were no less likely to be named than those that had not, but the incidence of semantic errors in comprehension correlated significantly with their incidence in naming. The implications of a semantic deficit common to both auditory comprehension and naming that is not specific to particular lexical items is discussed in relation to a number of information processing models of the lexicon.     

An examination of the hypothesis that left-handers die earlier: the Canadian Study of Health and Aging

The present paper is a prospective examination, using data from the Canadian Study of Health and Aging (CSHA-1 and CSHA-2), of the hypothesis that self-reported left-handers die earlier than right-handers. Persons over age 65 receiving a clinical evaluation in 1991 (n = 2786) as part of CSHA-1 were recontacted in 19956. At baseline, the sample showed a trend for the expected cross-generational decline in nonright-handedness with increasing age (3.2% of those aged 6574 reported being left-handers while 2.1% were left-handers in the 85+ age group). At follow-up, there were no significant differences in mortality between self-reported right-handers (52.6% died), left-handers (56.8%), and ambidexters (46.6%). The Odds Ratio was 1.18 (95% confidence interval 0.721.93) for left- compared to right-handers. There was no evidence that being left-handed increased the risk of death in this sample of elderly Canadians.     

Social stereotyping of left-handers in Serbia

Social tolerance towards left-handed people is commonly accepted in the twenty-first century, though not universal. However, at the level of social cognition a subtle bias against this visible minority group might not have disappeared. To investigate this possibility we adopted the theoretical framework of the stereotype content model (SCM) whereby two fundamental dimensions (warmth and competence) are sufficient to explain group differences in stereotype content. We examined how a large sample of medical students (N=300) perceived nine social groups (seven with various physical, social, or mental handicaps, and the two target groups of left- and right-handers), and four “anchor” groups comprising educated people, pensioners, drug addicts, and rich people) which are considered as prototypical in terms of the SCM. Hierarchical cluster analysis was performed to determine similarity of groups in the warmth×competence two-dimensional space. Four clusters were identified, with left- and right-handers located in the same cluster together with educated people. This cluster had higher ratings on both warmth and competence (i.e., more positive stereotype) compared with all other groups. However, within-cluster analysis showed that the left-handed group was perceived as lower on both dimensions compared to the right-handed group. This statistically significant difference suggests that implicit bias against left-handed individuals has not vanished despite pervasive social tolerance. Possible mechanisms that may explain this subtle and subliminal stereotyping are discussed.     

The semantic deficit in dementia: Connectionist approaches to what goes wrong in picture naming

Abstract

This paper addresses two main issues. First, what is the focus (or foci) of the naming deficit in patients with probable Alzheimer's disease? Secondly, how is semantic memory degraded by dementia? This paper will attempt to answer these questions by emphasizing connectionist modelling of semantic and neuropsychological processes. It will be argued that the loss of semantic microfeatures leads to the observed pattern of performance on naming and semantic memory tasks in dementia. These microfeatures may not represent linguistically simple lexical concepts or attributes, but are components of semantic representations that are relatively abstract. It is hypothesized that word meanings are equivalent to semantic attractors across these microfeatures. It is a central theme of this paper that connectionist modelling reveals how apparently disparate phenomena may in fact be related.     

The use of response analysis in confrontation naming

Abstract

Recent assessments of naming disorders in aphasic patients have used error classification as a means of analysing patients' erroneous responses in picture naming. This study assesses the usefulness of this methodology when applied to unselected aphasic patients in the early period following onset. It is concluded that naming analysis, as described in this study, is of limited but potentially important clinical value. The data indicate that the naming response pattern is not strongly related to aphasia classification. However, error response analysis as an isolated technique may provide some insight into the functional locus (or loci) of the naming deficit for some patients. Issues of clinical and theoretical interpretation of naming response patterns are discussed.     

The effect of perceptual reasoning abilities on confrontation naming performance: An examination of three naming tests

Introduction: Confrontation naming tests are a common neuropsychological method of assessing language and a critical diagnostic tool in identifying certain neurodegenerative diseases; however, there is limited literature examining the visual–perceptual demands of these tasks. This study investigated the effect of perceptual reasoning abilities on three confrontation naming tests, the Boston Naming Test (BNT), Neuropsychological Assessment Battery (NAB) Naming Test, and Visual Naming Test (VNT) to elucidate the diverse cognitive functions underlying these tasks to assist with test selection procedures and increase diagnostic accuracy. Method: A mixed clinical sample of 121 veterans were administered the BNT, NAB, VNT, and Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–4th Edition (WAIS–IV) Verbal Comprehension Index (VCI) and Perceptual Reasoning Index (PRI) as part of a comprehensive neuropsychological evaluation. Results: Multiple regression indicated that PRI accounted for 23%, 13%, and 15% of the variance in BNT, VNT, and NAB scores, respectively, but dropped out as a significant predictor once VCI was added. Follow-up bootstrap mediation analyses revealed that PRI had a significant indirect effect on naming performance after controlling education, primary language, and severity of cognitive impairment, as well as the mediating effect of general verbal abilities for the BNT (B = 0.13; 95% confidence interval, CI [.07, .20]), VNT (B = 0.01; 95% CI [.002, .03]), and NAB (B = 0.03; 95% CI [.01, .06]). Conclusions: Findings revealed a complex relationship between perceptual reasoning abilities and confrontation naming that is mediated by general verbal abilities. However, when verbal abilities were statistically controlled, perceptual reasoning abilities were found to have a significant indirect effect on performance across all three confrontation naming measures with the largest effect noted with the BNT relative to the VNT and NAB Naming Test.     

Category-specific neural processing for naming pictures of animals and naming pictures of tools: An ALE meta-analysis

Using activation-likelihood estimation (ALE) meta-analysis, we identified brain areas that are invoked when people name pictures of animals and pictures of tools. We found that naming animals and naming tools invoked separate distributed networks in the brain. Specifically, we found that naming animals invoked greater responses than naming tools in frontal lobe structures that are typically modulated by emotional content and task demands, and in a number of visual areas in the ventral stream. In contrast, naming tools invoked greater responses in a different set of areas in the ventral stream than those invoked by naming animals. Naming tools also invoked greater responses than naming animals in motor areas in the frontal lobe as well as in sensory areas in the parietal lobe. The only overlapping sites of activation that we found for naming these two categories of objects were in the left pars triangularis, the left inferior temporal gyrus, and the left parahippocampal gyrus. Taken together, our meta-analysis reveals that animals and tools are categorically represented in visual areas but show convergence in higher-order associative areas in the temporal and frontal lobes in regions that are typically regarded as being involved in memory and/or semantic processing. Our results also reveal that naming tools not only engages visual areas in the ventral stream but also a fronto-parietal network associated with tool use. Whether or not this network associated with tool use contributes directly to recognition will require further investigation.     

Greater brain response of left-handers to drugs

Among subjects participating in 14 placebo-controlled drug cross-over studies, left-handers showed a greater drug-related change in their electroencephalograms (EEGs) than did right-handers. Response differences between left- and right-handers were not hemisphere-specific. Further, the magnitude of EEG changes correlated with handedness scores. A greater effect of centrally active substances in left-handers may, in part, explain the high incidence of left-handers among those with certain brain-related pathologies and the evolution of right-hander predominance in the general population.     

On the automaticity/cerebellar deficit hypothesis of dyslexia: balancing and continuous rapid naming in dyslexic and ADHD children

The present study examined the relationship of reading disability (RD) and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) to balancing problems. In the cerebellar deficit hypothesis of dyslexia of Nicolson et al. [Trends Neurosci. 24 (2001) 508], balancing problems are taken as sign of a cerebellar deficit and were found to be associated with dyslexia. Four groups of 10 children each, representing all combinations of RD (absent versus present) and ADHD (absent versus present), were included. However, poor balancing (assessed both singly and together with a secondary task) was not found to be associated with RD, but with ADHD. In contrast, poor performance on continuous rapid naming tasks (digit and color naming) was found to be associated with RD and not with ADHD.     

An expectation-based memory deficit in aging

Memory performance can be enhanced by expectations regarding the appearance of ensuing stimuli. Here, we investigated the influence of stimulus-category expectation on memory performance in aging, and used fMRI to explore age-related alterations in associated neural mechanisms. Unlike younger adults, who demonstrated both working memory (WM) and long-term memory (LTM) performance benefits for face stimuli when this stimulus category was expected, older adults did not exhibit these memory benefits. Concordantly, older adults did not exhibit expectation-period activity modulation in visual association cortex (i.e., fusiform face area (FFA)), unlike youger adults. However, within the older population, individuals who demonstrated face-expectation memory benefits also exhibited expectation-period FFA activity modulation equivalent to younger adults. The older cohort also displayed diminished expectation-related functional connectivity between regions of the prefrontal cortex and the FFA, relative to younger adults, suggesting that network alterations underlie the absence of expectation-mediated cortical modulation and memory benefits. This deficit may have broader consequences for the effective utilization of predictive cues to guide attention and engender optimal cognitive performance in older individuals.     

An experimental analysis of acquisition,generalisation, and maintenance of naming behaviour in a patient with anomia

This paper examines the effects of a cueing hierarchy on naming in a patient with anomic aphasia. Using a single‐subject multiple baseline design across behaviors, the patient was trained to produce single inanimate nouns while generalization was tested to semantically related nouns matched for frequency of occurrence. Results showed successful acquisition and maintenance of trained words, but no generalization to untrained words. These data indicate that generalization does not occur as a natural by‐product of successful treatment and suggest, as pointed out by Baer, Wolf, and Risley (1968 Baer, D. M., Wolf, N. M. and Risley, T. R. 1968. Some current dimensions of applied behavior analysis.. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 1: 91[Crossref], [PubMed], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), that “generalization should be programmed rather than expected or lamented”.