Age, Hearing Loss, and Sentence Comprehension: Neural Correlates

年龄、听力损失和句子理解：神经相关性

• 批准号: 8242543
• 负责人: MURRAY GROSSMAN
• 金额: $ 41.9万
• 依托单位: UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 财政年份: 2012
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2012-09-01 至 2017-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/8242543
• 关键词: Accounting; Address; Adult; Affect; Age; Aging; Area; Atrophic; Auditory; Behavioral; Biological Neural Networks; Brain; Brain region; Cognitive; Cognitive aging; Complex; Comprehension; Data; Decision Making; Diffusion Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Early Diagnosis; Elderly; Equilibrium; Eye Movements; Financial compensation; Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging; Goals; Grant; Growth; Hearing; Image; Impaired cognition; Knowledge; Language; Lead; Left; Maintenance; Memory; Memory Loss; Modeling; Monitor; Neurocognitive; Parietal; Peripheral; Prefrontal Cortex; Presbycusis; Process; Reader; Reading; Semantics; Sensory; Short-Term Memory; Societies; Speech; Speed; Structure; System; Testing; Thick; Work; age difference; age related; aging brain; aging population; association cortex; base; gray matter; hearing impairment; imaging modality; innovation; language processing; lexical; neural patterning; neurobiological mechanism; novel; operation; phrases; relating to nervous system; syntax; white matter; young adult

DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Adult aging represents a balance of decline and compensation. This grant investigates the interacting effects of adult aging, age-related declines in hearing acuity, and engagement of the neural networks that underlie the ability to comprehend spoken sentences. Good progress has been made in understanding this balance at the behavioral level, but far less is known about the underlying neural substrates that carry these effects. In this grant we address the neural basis for aural sentence comprehension and how this is affected by perceptual effort due to reduced hearing acuity, and central cognitive loads such as those imposed by syntactic complexity, speech rate, working memory demands, and the semantic and syntactic ambiguities that occur in everyday discourse. We are guided by a novel model of sentence processing that implicates several dissociable neural substrates that become engaged depending on the cognitive and perceptual demands of the materials being processed. Our subjects will be healthy young and older adults with good hearing acuity and with mild-to-moderate hearing loss. We test our neurocognitive model using novel imaging methods that combine fMRI BOLD activation studies with structural imaging of gray matter thickness and white matter projections that integrate cortical areas. We hypothesize that this model of selective working memory and decision-making during sentence processing partially breaks down during aging because of limited white matter projections between brain regions, and cortical thinning in dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. We also assess potential compensatory mechanisms. Aim 1 examines effects of syntactic complexity and speech rate, Aim 2 specifically manipulates working memory load within sentences, and Aim 3 investigates decision-making needed to resolve lexical and syntactic ambiguities encountered during sentence processing. The proposed studies will close a critical gap in our knowledge of the interacting effects of cognitive aging and age-related hearing loss on everyday speech comprehension in older adults. This work may also serve as a framework for early detection of pathological change as it affects language comprehension in the aging brain.) ) PUBLIC HEALTH RELEVANCE: Adult aging represents a balance of decline and compensation, and this grant investigates the interacting effects of adult aging, age-related hearing loss, and patterns of neural compensation while listening to and understanding spoken sentences. Using the perspective of a novel neurocognitive model of sentence processing, we test our approach with innovative imaging methods that combine fMRI BOLD activation studies with structural imaging of gray matter thickness and white matter projections that integrate brain areas activated while listening to speech. These studies will close a critical gap in our knowledge of the interacting effects of cognitive aging and age-related hearing loss on everyday speech comprehension in older adults, and may also serve as a framework for early detection of pathological change as it affects language comprehension in the aging brain.

描述（由申请人提供）： 成人衰老代表衰退和补偿的平衡。这笔赠款研究了成人衰老、与年龄相关的听力敏锐度下降以及构成理解口语句子能力的神经网络的参与之间的相互作用。在理解行为层面的这种平衡方面已经取得了良好进展，但对带来这些影响的潜在神经基质知之甚少。在这笔资助中，我们研究了听觉句子理解的神经基础，以及由于听力敏锐度下降而导致的知觉努力和中心认知负荷（例如句法复杂性、语速、工作记忆需求以及日常话语中出现的语义和句法模糊性所施加的中心认知负荷）如何影响听觉句子理解的神经基础。我们以一种新颖的句子处理模型为指导，该模型涉及几种可分离的神经基质，这些神经基质根据正在处理的材料的认知和感知需求而参与其中。我们的受试者将是健康的年轻人和老年人，具有良好的听力敏锐度和轻度至中度听力损失。我们使用新颖的成像方法测试我们的神经认知模型，该方法将 fMRI BOLD 激活研究与灰质厚度和整合皮质区域的白质投影的结构成像相结合。我们假设，由于大脑区域之间的白质投射有限以及背外侧前额叶皮层的皮质变薄，这种句子处理过程中的选择性工作记忆和决策模型在衰老过程中部分崩溃。我们还评估潜在的补偿机制。目标 1 检查句法复杂性和语速的影响，目标 2 专门操纵句子内的工作记忆负载，目标 3 研究解决句子处理过程中遇到的词汇和句法歧义所需的决策。拟议的研究将弥补我们对认知衰老和年龄相关听力损失对老年人日常言语理解的相互作用影响的认识上的一个关键差距。这项工作也可以作为早期检测病理变化的框架，因为它会影响衰老大脑的语言理解。）） 公共健康相关性：成人衰老代表着衰退和补偿的平衡，这项拨款研究了成人衰老、与年龄相关的听力损失以及聆听和理解口语句子时的神经补偿模式的相互作用。利用句子处理的新型神经认知模型的视角，我们用创新的成像方法测试了我们的方法，该方法将 fMRI BOLD 激活研究与灰质厚度和白质投影的结构成像相结合，整合了听语音时激活的大脑区域。这些研究将弥补我们对认知衰老和年龄相关听力损失对老年人日常言语理解的相互作用影响的认识上的一个关键差距，并且还可以作为早期检测病理变化的框架，因为它会影响衰老大脑的语言理解。