scholarly journals Morphosyntactic Production and Verbal Working Memory: Evidence From Greek Aphasia and Healthy Aging

2018 ◽  
Vol 61 (5) ◽  
pp. 1171-1187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Valantis Fyndanis ◽  
Giorgio Arcara ◽  
Paraskevi Christidou ◽  
David Caplan
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Healthy Aging ◽  
Nonlocal Conditions ◽  
Verbal Working Memory ◽  
Sentence Completion ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Tense And Aspect ◽  
Verb Agreement ◽  
Agrammatic Aphasia ◽  
The Individual

Purpose The present work investigated whether verbal working memory (WM) affects morphosyntactic production in configurations that do not involve or favor similarity-based interference and whether WM interacts with verb-related morphosyntactic categories and/or cue–target distance (locality). It also explored whether the findings related to the questions above lend support to a recent account of agrammatic morphosyntactic production: Interpretable Features' Impairment Hypothesis (Fyndanis, Varlokosta, & Tsapkini, 2012). Method A sentence completion task testing production of subject–verb agreement, tense/time reference, and aspect in local and nonlocal conditions and two verbal WM tasks were administered to 8 Greek-speaking persons with agrammatic aphasia (PWA) and 103 healthy participants. Results The 3 morphosyntactic categories dissociated in both groups (agreement > tense > aspect). A significant interaction emerged in both groups between the 3 morphosyntactic categories and WM. There was no main effect of locality in either of the 2 groups. At the individual level, all 8 PWA exhibited dissociations between agreement, tense, and aspect, and effects of locality were contradictory. Conclusions Results suggest that individuals with WM limitations (both PWA and healthy older speakers) show dissociations between the production of verb-related morphosyntactic categories. WM affects performance shaping the pattern of morphosyntactic production (in Greek: subject–verb agreement > tense > aspect). The absence of an effect of locality suggests that executive capacities tapped by WM tasks are involved in morphosyntactic processing of demanding categories even when the cue is adjacent to the target. Results are consistent with the Interpretable Features' Impairment Hypothesis (Fyndanis et al., 2012). Supplemental Material https://doi.org/10.23641/asha.6024428

scholarly journals Lexical Competition Effects in Aphasia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Christina May Louise Cameron-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Word Production ◽  
Sentence Completion ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Lexical Competition ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Name Agreement ◽  
Mixed Support ◽  
Competition Condition ◽  
Competition Effects ◽  
The Individual

<p>Some aphasic patients show single word production deficits in some situations where object naming is required (e.g., they perform well when objects are presented in unrelated groups (e.g., Cat, Fork, Bread...), but deteriorate when the same items are presented in semantically related groups (e.g., Cat, Cow, Dog...)) (see Wilshire & McCarthy, 2002). We investigated whether context-sensitive single-word production impairments reflect an impaired ability to resolve lexical competition. Three groups of participants (non-fluent aphasics, fluent aphasics, and older controls) completed four tasks that manipulated lexical competition: 1) A category exemplar task, where a high competition condition involved generating items from broad categories (e.g., Animals: "Cat. Dog" etc.), and a low competition condition involved generating items from narrow categories (e.g., Pets: Cat. Dog" etc); 2) A verb generation task, where participants were presented with objects and were required to generate related verbs. The high competition objects were related to a range of verbs (e.g., Penny: Spend"/"Pay"/"Buy" etc), and the low competition objects were related to one dominant verb (e.g., Scissors: "Cut"); 3) A name agreement task where a high competition condition involved naming low name agreement objects (e.g., Artist/Painter), and a low competition condition involved naming of high name agreement objects (e.g., Anchor), and; 4) A sentence completion task, where extrinsic competition was introduced via presentation of auditory distracters. The low competition distracters did not make sense (e.g., Barry wisely chose to pay the RANGE: "Bill"/"Cashier" etc), whereas the high competition distracters did (e.g., Barry wisely chose to pay the FINE: "Bill"/Cashier" etc). Our first hypothesis was that all participants would show high competition costs in increased response latencies and/or decreased accuracy. At the group level, this hypothesis was supported in all four tasks. At the individual level, there was mixed support as some participants showed predicted effects on the verb generation, name agreement, and sentence completion tasks. The second hypothesis was that exaggerated competition costs would occur in some or all non-fluent aphasics. At the group level this hypothesis was not clearly supported on any task. At the individual level there was mixed support, with some indications that non-fluents may be more likely to show significant competition effects than fluents. The third hypothesis was that non-fluent aphasics with relatively well preserved single word production but relatively impaired sentence production may be most likely to show exaggerated lexical competition effects. There was little support for this hypothesis. It was concluded that the data do not support the hypothesis that context-sensitive single-word production impairments are symptomatic of an impaired ability to resolve lexical competition. However, we have gained information on how heterogeneous aphasics perform on tasks that manipulate lexical competition, and we have gained some insights that may direct future research down a path towards more informative results, and increased knowledge on the complex process of speech production.</p>

scholarly journals The forward testing effect is reliable and independent of learners’ working memory capacity

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernhard Pastötter ◽  
Christian Frings
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Testing Effect ◽  
Retrieval Practice ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
Retest Reliability ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Test Retest Reliability

The forward testing effect refers to the finding that retrieval practice of previously studied information enhances learning and retention of subsequently studied other information. While most of the previous research on the forward testing effect examined group differences, the present study took an individual differences approach to investigate this effect. Experiment 1 examined whether the forward effect has test-retest reliability between two experimental sessions. Experiment 2 investigated whether the effect is related to participants’ working memory capacity. In both experiments (and each session of Experiment 1), participants studied three lists of items in anticipation of a final cumulative recall test. In the testing condition, participants were tested immediately on lists 1 and 2, whereas in the restudy condition, they restudied lists 1 and 2. In both conditions, participants were tested immediately on list 3. On the group level, the results of both experiments demonstrated a forward testing effect, with interim testing of lists 1 and 2 enhancing immediate recall of list 3. On the individual level, the results of Experiment 1 showed that the forward effect on list 3 recall has moderate test-retest reliability between two experimental sessions. In addition, the results of Experiment 2 showed that the forward effect on list 3 recall does not depend on participants’ working memory capacity. These findings suggest that the forward testing effect is reliable at the individual level and affects learners at a wide range of working memory capacities alike. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.

scholarly journals Executive Function Variation in Children With Conduct Problems: Influences of Coexisting Reading Difficulties

2017 ◽  
Vol 51 (2) ◽  
pp. 168-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angeliki Kallitsoglou
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Executive Function ◽  
Conduct Problems ◽  
Response Inhibition ◽  
Verbal Working Memory ◽  
Intellectual Ability ◽  
Sentence Completion ◽  
Poor Reading ◽  
Significant Group ◽  
The Difference

It is unknown whether children with conduct problems (CP) and poor reading (PR) skills exhibit more profound executive function impairments than children with CP only and whether such impairments are explained by coexisting PR. Executive functions were compared in four groups of 7- to 8-year-old children: 26 CP only, 35 PR only, 27 CP-PR, and 31 comparison (COM) children with neither CP nor PR. The Conners’ Teacher Rating Scale–28 and a sentence completion reading test were used to assess CP and PR skills. The Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children–Third Edition Backward Digit Span, the Conners’ Continuous Performance Test, and the Tower of London were used to assess three aspects of executive function: verbal working memory, response inhibition, and planning, respectively. The CP-PR group had lower verbal working memory than the CP-only and COM groups, but the difference was not significant after intellectual ability, inattention, and hyperactivity were controlled. The CP-PR group made more errors in the planning task (rule violations) than the COM and CP-only groups, but the difference was not significant after intellectual ability was controlled. No significant group differences were found in response inhibition. A specific PR group effect was found for verbal working memory. Children with CP-PR have more prominent executive function impairments that cannot be attributed to coexisting PR.

scholarly journals Cortisol Responses to a Laboratory Challenge: The Moderating Role of Cognitive Performance

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (Supplement_1) ◽  
pp. 362-362
Author(s):  
Elise Grimm ◽  
Stefan Agrigoroaei
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Cognitive Performance ◽  
Sex Education ◽  
Stress Responses ◽  
Healthy Aging ◽  
Protective Factor ◽  
Cortisol Response ◽  
Caffeine Consumption ◽  
The Individual

Abstract Recent theoretical and empirical studies have considered higher cognitive performance as a protective factor with respect to reactivity, recovery and habituation to acute stressors. The goal of our study was to examine the individual role of inhibition, working memory, processing speed, reasoning, and category fluency in the regulation of the cortisol response to a laboratory challenge. Younger, middle-aged, and older participants (N =109, aged 22-84, M=55.90, SD=16.35) were invited to a laboratory session comprising a driving simulation and a set of cognitive tasks. At least one week in advance, baseline cognitive performance was measured using the Brief Test of Adult Cognition by Telephone (BTACT). Throughout the lab session, five saliva samples were taken, which allowed for the computation of a global measure of cortisol release (area under the curve (AUC)). Cortisol AUC was regressed on the individual BTACT cognitive tests, while controlling for age, sex, education, body mass index, physical activity, and time since awakening. The results revealed that inhibition and working memory significantly accounted for the cortisol response. These associations remained significant when other factors such as smoking, caffeine consumption, and medication use were included as covariates. The contributions of reasoning and speed of processing approached significance. Our findings contribute to the emerging evidence that cognitive functioning modulates stress responses to acute stressors. The findings are discussed in the context of cognitive interventions with transfers and implications for stress processes and healthy aging.

scholarly journals Intrapair Comparison of Life-Course Appetite and Physical Activity in Elderly Danish Twins: Reliability and Association With Subsequent Survival

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (5) ◽  
pp. 447-455 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura E. Løkkegaard ◽  
Lisbeth A. Larsen ◽  
Kaare Christensen
Keyword(s):  
Physical Activity ◽  
Life Course ◽  
Healthy Aging ◽  
Positive Association ◽  
Late Life ◽  
Lifestyle Factors ◽  
Physically Active ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Life Course

Avoiding overeating and being physically active is associated with healthy aging, but methodological issues challenge the quantification of the association. Intrapair comparison of twins is a study design that attempts to minimize social norm-driven biased self-reporting of lifestyle factors. We aimed to investigate the association between self-reported lifestyle factors and subsequent survival in 347 Danish twin pairs aged 70 years and older and, additionally, to investigate the reliability of these self-reports. The twins were interviewed in 2003 and followed for mortality until 2015. They were asked to compare their appetite and physical activity to that of their co-twins in different stages of life. On an individual level, we found a positive association between current self-reported physical activity and late-life survival for elderly twins. This was supported by the intrapair analyses, which revealed a positive association between midlife and current physical activity and late-life survival. A positive association between lower appetite and late-life survival was found generally over the life course in the individual level analyses but not in the intrapair analyses. Kappa values for the inter-twin agreement on who ate the most were 0.16 to 0.34 in different life stages, and for physical activity 0.19 to 0.26, corresponding to a slight-to-fair agreement. Approximately, 50% of the twin pairs were not in agreement regarding physical activity, and of these twins 75% (95% CI: 67–82%) considered themselves the most active twin. These findings indicate a still-existing tendency of answering according to social norms, even in a twin study designed to minimize this.

scholarly journals Lexical Competition Effects in Aphasia

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
◽  
Christina May Louise Cameron-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Word Production ◽  
Sentence Completion ◽  
Single Word ◽  
Lexical Competition ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Name Agreement ◽  
Mixed Support ◽  
Competition Condition ◽  
Competition Effects ◽  
The Individual

<p>Some aphasic patients show single word production deficits in some situations where object naming is required (e.g., they perform well when objects are presented in unrelated groups (e.g., Cat, Fork, Bread...), but deteriorate when the same items are presented in semantically related groups (e.g., Cat, Cow, Dog...)) (see Wilshire & McCarthy, 2002). We investigated whether context-sensitive single-word production impairments reflect an impaired ability to resolve lexical competition. Three groups of participants (non-fluent aphasics, fluent aphasics, and older controls) completed four tasks that manipulated lexical competition: 1) A category exemplar task, where a high competition condition involved generating items from broad categories (e.g., Animals: "Cat. Dog" etc.), and a low competition condition involved generating items from narrow categories (e.g., Pets: Cat. Dog" etc); 2) A verb generation task, where participants were presented with objects and were required to generate related verbs. The high competition objects were related to a range of verbs (e.g., Penny: Spend"/"Pay"/"Buy" etc), and the low competition objects were related to one dominant verb (e.g., Scissors: "Cut"); 3) A name agreement task where a high competition condition involved naming low name agreement objects (e.g., Artist/Painter), and a low competition condition involved naming of high name agreement objects (e.g., Anchor), and; 4) A sentence completion task, where extrinsic competition was introduced via presentation of auditory distracters. The low competition distracters did not make sense (e.g., Barry wisely chose to pay the RANGE: "Bill"/"Cashier" etc), whereas the high competition distracters did (e.g., Barry wisely chose to pay the FINE: "Bill"/Cashier" etc). Our first hypothesis was that all participants would show high competition costs in increased response latencies and/or decreased accuracy. At the group level, this hypothesis was supported in all four tasks. At the individual level, there was mixed support as some participants showed predicted effects on the verb generation, name agreement, and sentence completion tasks. The second hypothesis was that exaggerated competition costs would occur in some or all non-fluent aphasics. At the group level this hypothesis was not clearly supported on any task. At the individual level there was mixed support, with some indications that non-fluents may be more likely to show significant competition effects than fluents. The third hypothesis was that non-fluent aphasics with relatively well preserved single word production but relatively impaired sentence production may be most likely to show exaggerated lexical competition effects. There was little support for this hypothesis. It was concluded that the data do not support the hypothesis that context-sensitive single-word production impairments are symptomatic of an impaired ability to resolve lexical competition. However, we have gained information on how heterogeneous aphasics perform on tasks that manipulate lexical competition, and we have gained some insights that may direct future research down a path towards more informative results, and increased knowledge on the complex process of speech production.</p>

The interaction of notional number and morphophonology in subject–verb agreement: A role for working memory

2018 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
pp. 890-900
Author(s):  
Heidi Lorimor ◽  
Carrie N Jackson ◽  
Janet G van Hell
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Noun Phrase ◽  
Working Memory Capacity ◽  
Noun Phrases ◽  
Memory Capacity ◽  
Sentence Completion ◽  
Verb Agreement ◽  
Subject Noun ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Impact

Research shows that cross-linguistically, subject–verb agreement with complex noun phrases (e.g., The label on the bottles) is influenced by notional number and the presence of homophony in case, gender, or number morphology. Less well-understood is whether notional number and morphophonology interact during speech production, and whether the relative impact of these two factors is influenced by working memory capacity. Using an auditory sentence completion task, we investigated the impact of notional number and morphophonology on agreement with complex subject noun phrases in Dutch. Results revealed main effects of notional number and morphophonology. Critically, there was also an interaction between morphophonology and notional number because participants showed greater notional effects when the determiners were homophonous and morphophonologically ambiguous. Furthermore, participants with higher working memory scores made fewer agreement errors when the subject noun phrase contained homophonous determiners, and this effect was greater when the subject noun phrase was notionally singular. These findings support the hypothesis that cue-based retrieval plays a role in agreement production, and suggests that the ability to correctly assign subject–verb agreement—especially in the presence of homophonous determiners—is modulated by working memory capacity.

Basic numerical processing, calculation, and working memory in children with dyscalculia and/or ADHD symptoms

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (5) ◽  
pp. 365-375 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jörg-Tobias Kuhn ◽  
Elena Ise ◽  
Julia Raddatz ◽  
Christin Schwenk ◽  
Christian Dobel
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Processing Speed ◽  
Verbal Working Memory ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Cognitive Profiles ◽  
Adhd Symptoms ◽  
Memory Processing ◽  
Numerical Processing ◽  
Hyperactivity Disorder ◽  
Neurocognitive Measures

Abstract. Objective: Deficits in basic numerical skills, calculation, and working memory have been found in children with developmental dyscalculia (DD) as well as children with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). This paper investigates cognitive profiles of children with DD and/or ADHD symptoms (AS) in a double dissociation design to obtain a better understanding of the comorbidity of DD and ADHD. Method: Children with DD-only (N = 33), AS-only (N = 16), comorbid DD+AS (N = 20), and typically developing controls (TD, N = 40) were assessed on measures of basic numerical processing, calculation, working memory, processing speed, and neurocognitive measures of attention. Results: Children with DD (DD, DD+AS) showed deficits in all basic numerical skills, calculation, working memory, and sustained attention. Children with AS (AS, DD+AS) displayed more selective difficulties in dot enumeration, subtraction, verbal working memory, and processing speed. Also, they generally performed more poorly in neurocognitive measures of attention, especially alertness. Children with DD+AS mostly showed an additive combination of the deficits associated with DD-only and A_Sonly, except for subtraction tasks, in which they were less impaired than expected. Conclusions: DD and AS appear to be related to largely distinct patterns of cognitive deficits, which are present in combination in children with DD+AS.


Differential Effects of Competence and Morality on Self-Esteem at the Individual and the Collective Level

2020 ◽  
Vol 51 (3) ◽  
pp. 183-198
Author(s):  
Wiktor Soral ◽  
Mirosław Kofta
Keyword(s):  
Self Esteem ◽  
Differential Effects ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Individual

Abstract. The importance of various trait dimensions explaining positive global self-esteem has been the subject of numerous studies. While some have provided support for the importance of agency, others have highlighted the importance of communion. This discrepancy can be explained, if one takes into account that people define and value their self both in individual and in collective terms. Two studies ( N = 367 and N = 263) examined the extent to which competence (an aspect of agency), morality, and sociability (the aspects of communion) promote high self-esteem at the individual and the collective level. In both studies, competence was the strongest predictor of self-esteem at the individual level, whereas morality was the strongest predictor of self-esteem at the collective level.

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