Applied Neuropsychology-Adult最新文献

Parkinson's disease (PD) is a neurodegenerative disorder affecting 1% of people older than 60 years. One of the abilities that seems vulnerable to the cognitive impairments associated with PD is financial capability. This explorative study aimed to evaluate the extent and type of problems in financial capability of people with PD without a diagnosis of dementia. Participants were 31 people with PD and 62 matched controls. Participants completed an extensive test-battery, including measures for financial capability and cognitive functioning. Compared to controls, the PD-group performed significantly poorer on two financial competence tasks and showed a comparable performance on the other financial capability measures. For 45% of the PD-group, cognitive test performance was indicative of mild cognitive impairment, yet no significant difference was observed in overall cognitive functioning between the PD and control group. In the total sample, only small or medium correlations were found between financial competence and cognition, and between financial capability and the contextual factors of income and financial experience. The findings suggest that in the earlier stages of PD, when cognitive impairments are relatively mild, some problems may be observed in financial competence, yet other domains of financial capability appear less affected. The absence of strong correlations between financial competence and overall cognitive functioning indicates that standard neuropsychological assessments seem inadequate to make financial capability determinations. By offering insight into the financial capability of people in the milder stages of PD, the findings of the present study may aid in the development and provision of tailored support.

Background: Eye-tracking (ET) technology shows promise in improving the assessment of Unilateral Spatial Neglect (USN) by overcoming the limitations in sensitivity of traditional paper-and-pencil tests. This scoping review aimed to explore current trends in the use of ET for evaluating USN.

Methods: Seven databases were systematically searched. The methodology followed the Joanna Briggs Institute guidelines for scoping reviews.

Results: Twenty publications were included, involving 282 healthy adults and 457 post-stroke individuals. Left-sided USN was reported in 96% of participants, while right-sided USN was reported in 2%. ET was used alone in most studies (n = 15), while others combined it with virtual reality (VR) technologies. The most common task involved the free exploration of static scenes (n = 11). Far extra-personal space was explored in 4/20 studies, three of which used VR technology and a dynamic environment. Numerous eye movement measurements were analyzed. In six studies, correlations between ET measures and traditional tests were moderate to strong, particularly for gaze shift, and this applied to both right- and left-sided USN.

Conclusions: Eye movements measured by ET appear useful for detecting USN, including the less commonly assessed right-sided cases. Further studies are needed to assess the clinical feasibility of integrating this approach into standard practice.

Objective: To analyze the role of cognitive reserve (CR) in successful aging among community-dwelling older adults.

Method: A random sample of n = 456 adults aged 60 years and older (mean age = 72.6, SD = 7.89; 59% women) was evaluated. CR was measured through indicators such as education, lifelong learning, bilingualism, participation, and the use of information and communication technologies (ICT). Successful aging was operationalized as the absence of major diseases and disabilities, good physical and cognitive functioning, and active engagement. Sociodemographic and health data were collected. Descriptive analyses, correlations, and multivariate analyses of variance were conducted to explore the effect of CR on successful aging and its criteria.

Results: Successful aging was observed in 12.1% of participants and was associated with differences in ICT use, social participation, bilingualism, and lifelong occupation. Cognitive reserve explained 20.1% of the variance, showing stronger effects on absence of major disease and life engagement, moderate effects on physical and cognitive functioning, and no significant association with independence in instrumental activities of daily living.

Conclusions: Cognitive reserve was significantly associated with successful aging, representing a key target for cognitive interventions not only to prevent cognitive decline but also to promote successful and healthy aging among older adults.

Objective: This study aimed to assess the validity and reliability of the Turkish version of the Brief Cognitive Assessment Tool (BCAT) in differentiating between older adults with major Neurocognitive Disorder (MNCD) and mild neurocognitive disorder (MiNCD), and cognitively normal (CN) individuals.

Method: Participants were categorized into MNCD (n = 152), MiNCD (n = 73), and CN (n = 53) groups by Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-5 criteria. The BCAT was translated and culturally adapted into Turkish. All participants completed the BCAT, Mini Mental State Examination, Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), Clock Drawing Test, and Öktem's Auditory Verbal Learning Test. Internal consistency, test-retest reliability, and concurrent validity with MoCA were assessed. Receiver operating characteristic analysis was employed to determine a cutoff point for BCAT.

Results: BCAT scores showed high internal consistency and test-retest reliability. BCAT and MoCA scores correlated strongly, confirming convergent validity. MNCD group had lower BCAT scores than MiNCD and CN across multiple cognitive domains. At a cutoff score of 33, BCAT distinguished MNCD from MiNCD and CN.

Conclusions: Our findings suggest that the Turkish version of the BCAT is a valid and reliable screening tool for cognitive impairment in older adults. It effectively differentiates between MNCD, MiNCD, and CN individuals, supporting its clinical utility for early detection of neurocognitive disorders.

Objective: Semantic and phonemic verbal fluency (VF) tasks are widely used to assess older adults' cognition in clinical practice. Typical scoring only analyses the total number of correct words produced. We investigated whether differentiation between individuals with subjective cognitive decline (SCD) versus mild cognitive impairment (MCI), which is often challenging, could be enhanced by also assessing linguistic (clustering) characteristics of VF responses.

Method: In this cross-sectional study, we retrospectively analyzed 426 VF responses from 127 community-dwelling older adults with SCD or MCI who underwent cognitive assessment in a memory clinic setting. Using mixed-effect models, we tested whether including linguistic (clustering) characteristics in addition to the total number of correct words enhanced the prediction of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) score and clinical group (SCD or MCI), when adjusted for age, sex, education level, and repeated measures alongside with task type.

Results: A lower mean phonetic cluster size in both SVF and PVF was associated with a lower MoCA score. Adding clustering characteristics to the model of SVF (although not PVF) significantly improved classification into SCD versus MCI, compared to the model with the number of correct words alone.

Conclusions: Retrieving sequences of words based on their phonetic proximity while performing not only PVF but also SVF tasks pointed to more preserved cognitive functioning and appeared vulnerable to early cognitive changes. Linguistic analysis of VF performance can capture subtle cognitive reorganization missed by scoring of the total number of correct words only and may enhance early dementia-risk profiling.

Introduction: While the ability to understand others' mental states (Theory of Mind, ToM) is fundamental for social interactions, its relationship with executive functions (EF) in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) remains under-explored. This study investigated ToM abilities and three core EFs (working memory, response inhibition, and planning) in adults with ADHD compared to a healthy control group.

Methods: Thirty adults with ADHD were matched with thirty controls on age, gender, IQ, and education. ToM was assessed using the Strange Stories Test. EFs were evaluated using four subtests from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB): Spatial Span (SSP) for short-term memory, Spatial Working Memory (SWM) for working memory, Stockings of Cambridge (SOC) for planning, and Stop Signal Task (SST) for response inhibition. Mann-Whitney U tests compared groups, and Spearman's rho examined ToM-EF relationships.

Results: Individuals with ADHD showed significantly poorer performance on the Strange Stories Test and all CANTAB subtests compared to controls. Within the ADHD group, most EF components showed no significant correlation with ToM scores.

Conclusions: These findings confirm deficits in both ToM and EFs in adults with ADHD. The lack of strong correlations suggests that ToM difficulties may represent a distinct cognitive domain, independent of core EF impairments.

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a heterogeneous syndrome with varying cognitive profiles and trajectories. Amnestic MCI (aMCI) is associated with memory deficits and increased risk of Alzheimer's disease, while non-amnestic MCI (naMCI) often involves executive dysfunction and may signal risk for other dementias. Encoding deficits, though more prominent in aMCI, are also observed in naMCI. This study examined the utility of the Neuropsychological Assessment Battery (NAB) learning ratio (LR) scores-specifically List LR, Story LR, and an Aggregate LR-to distinguish among cognitively normal individuals, aMCI, and naMCI in a real-world clinical sample (N = 121). The NAB Aggregate LR showed superior diagnostic discriminability, with significantly larger effect sizes and greater predictive value in differentiating aMCI from naMCI compared to individual LRs. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis confirmed strong classification accuracy (area under the curve [AUC] = .824). Findings suggest encoding performance, as captured by the Aggregate LR, reflects underlying differences in cognitive processing and neuroanatomical involvement across MCI subtypes. The Aggregate LR also demonstrated stronger associations with executive functioning in naMCI. These results highlight the NAB Aggregate LR as a clinically valuable tool for improving differential diagnosis in MCI, which may support earlier and more targeted interventions to improve patient outcomes. Notably, the Aggregate LR accounted for incremental variance in group classification beyond age, IQ, and individual LRs. Its sensitivity to both memory and executive dysfunction-especially in early-stage impairment-underscores its utility in clinical neuropsychological assessment. Earlier and more precise identification of MCI subtypes may enable more effective cognitive interventions and improve long-term care planning.

Objective: The study examined emotion recognition (ER) across visual and auditory modalities in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) and frontal lobe epilepsy (FLE), and explored associations with perceived social functioning (SF).

Method: Fifty patients (30 TLE, 20 FLE) and 50 healthy controls (HC) completed tasks assessing recognition of facial emotion and emotional prosody across seven emotions: neutral, happiness, surprise, anger, disgust, fear, and sadness. Patients also completed the Social Functioning subscale of the Quality of Life in Epilepsy Inventory-31 (QOLIE-31) and self-report questionnaires assessing affective symptoms.

Results: Both TLE and FLE groups exhibited overall ER deficits across modalities compared to HC, with performance varying by emotion. TLE participants showed difficulties in recognizing fear and disgust across both modalities, whereas FLE participants were impaired in auditory recognition of these emotions and visual recognition of fear. Emotion differentiation impairments were relatively comparable across epilepsy types and modalities. Although groups did not differ in their relative performance across modalities, subsequent correlational analyses revealed a modest association between modalities in patients, but not controls. Within the patient group, the only significant association with perceived SF emerged for recognition of neutral prosodic features in the FLE group.

Conclusion: Individuals with TLE and FLE experience difficulties recognizing emotions from both facial expressions and vocal cues, especially those with negative valence. Limited associations between ER and perceived SF were observed only in FLE patients. The findings underscore the importance of assessing sociocognitive functioning in PWE.