The neural substrate of expressive language functions in healthy and pathological aging

健康和病理衰老中表达语言功能的神经基础

• 批准号: 59921714
• 负责人: Professor Dr. Marcus Meinzer
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Klinik und Poliklinik für Neurologie
• 依托单位国家: 德国
• 项目类别: Research Fellowships
• 财政年份: 2007
• 资助国家: 德国
• 起止时间: 2006-12-31 至 2010-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://gepris.dfg.de/gepris/projekt/59921714?language=en
• 关键词: neural; substrate; expressive; language; functions

In the context of the increasing average lifespan worldwide, research on the underlying causes of age-related cognitive decline is of the utmost significance. Previous research using functional imaging techniques has linked behavioral changes in old age in several cognitive domains to reduced asymmetry of task-related cortical activity mainly in frontal brain areas. Still, little is known about the neural substrate of age-related word-retrieval difficulties even though these are (a) frequently observed in old-age and (b) among the earliest signs of pathological aging (i.e., dementia). Only one study so far used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during a naming task and demonstrated reduced left-frontal lateralization in older adults, which was associated with impaired behavioral performance. The focus of the present project will be to further elucidate the neural concomitants of impaired word-finding in healthy older adults and in patients with Mild Cognitive Impairment. This will be accomplished by means of fMRI during several overt language tasks that specifically manipulate demands on frontal executive language functions. Here, the overt design will allow to relate age-related changes brain activity to behavioral performance. Moreover, we will explore whether the potentially detrimental lesslateralized activity pattern in old-age can be modulated by a training that is designed to strengthen left-frontal brain activity and wether this leads to an improvement of language function.

在全世界平均寿命不断延长的背景下，研究与年龄有关的认知能力下降的根本原因具有极其重要的意义。以前的研究使用功能成像技术已经联系到老年人在几个认知领域的行为变化，以减少主要在额叶脑区的任务相关的皮层活动的不对称性。尽管如此，人们对年龄相关的单词检索困难的神经基础知之甚少，尽管这些困难（a）经常在老年人中观察到，（B）是病理性衰老的最早迹象之一（即，痴呆症）。到目前为止，只有一项研究在命名任务中使用了功能性磁共振成像（fMRI），并证明老年人的左额叶侧化减少，这与行为表现受损有关。本项目的重点将是进一步阐明健康老年人和轻度认知障碍患者的词发现受损的神经伴随因素。这将通过功能磁共振成像在几个明显的语言任务，具体操纵额叶执行语言功能的需求。在这里，公开的设计将允许将与年龄相关的大脑活动变化与行为表现联系起来。此外，我们将探讨是否可以通过旨在加强左额叶活动的训练来调节老年人潜在的有害的少侧化活动模式，以及这是否会导致语言功能的改善。