scholarly journals Characteristics of Clustering and Switching in Verbal Fluency according to Healthy Elderly Group

2021 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 630-640
Author(s):  
Juyeong Kim ◽  
Hyunjoo Choi
Keyword(s):  
Old Age ◽  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
Age Group ◽  
Semantic Fluency ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Healthy Elderly ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Phonemic Verbal Fluency ◽  
Fluency Task

Objectives: The purpose of this study was to investigate the characteristics of clusters and switches through verbal fluency tasks by different age groups among the elderly.Methods: Ninety-four healthy elderly adults participated in this study. The verbal fluency task consisted of semantic verbal fluency and phonemic verbal fluency. The categories of ‘animal’ and ‘supermarket’ were used for semantic fluency, and the categories ‘/k/’, ‘/o/’ and ‘/s/’ were used for phonemic fluency.Results: First, there was a significant difference between the age groups. The number of correct responses in the verbal fluency task decreased as age increased. Second, the mean cluster size for verbal fluency did not show a significant difference among groups in tasks of semantic and phonemic verbal fluency. Third, the number of switches showed a significant difference between groups in semantic and phonemic verbal fluency. In the post-analysis results of semantic fluency, a significant difference was found in the category of ‘animals’ between the young-old and old-old age group, and a significant difference was found in the number of switches in the category of ‘supermarket’ between the middle-old and old-old age group. Finally, the semantic fluency task showed the highest frequency of perseverative error, and the phonemic fluency task showed the highest frequency of other errors.Conclusion: These results of this study are meaningful in investigating characteristics of cluster and switch as well as the performance of correct rate through the verbal fluency tasks according to the elderly group.

scholarly journals Normative data for healthy elderly on the phonemic verbal fluency task - FAS

2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-60 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thais Helena Machado ◽  
Helenice Charchat Fichman ◽  
Etelvina Lucas Santos ◽  
Viviane Amaral Carvalho ◽  
Patrícia Paes Fialho ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Test Performance ◽  
Educational Level ◽  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Normative Data ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
The Elderly ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Healthy Elderly ◽  
Phonemic Verbal Fluency ◽  
Student’S T

Abstract Phonemic verbal fluency tests assess the production of words beginning with specific letters. Of these letters, the most frequently used are F, A and S. It is a sensitive test for assessing frontal lobe functions. Objective: To provide normative data for the elderly Brazilian population on the FAS test and to investigate the effects of age and schooling on test performance. Methods: The individuals were divided into three age groups (60-69, 70-79 and ³80 years), and into four groups according to education (1-3, 4-7, 8-11 and ³12 years). All subjects were assessed by the Mini Mental State Examination and the FAS. Data were analyzed with Student's t test, ANOVA, simple linear regression and Spearman's correlation. Results: We evaluated 345 cognitively healthy volunteers, 66.66% being female, aged 60 to 93 years, with an educational level ranging from one to 24 years. The average (number of items) ±SD for the whole sample was 28.28±11.53. No significant effect of gender was observed (p=0.5). Performance on the MMSE and education exerted a direct influence on FAS scores (p<0.001), with education being the most significant factor. A positive correlation was found between FAS and the MMSE (r=0.404; p<0.001). Conclusion: The performance of Brazilian elderly on the phonemic verbal fluency tests-FAS is significantly influenced by education, where individuals with higher educational level present better performance than those with fewer years of schooling. Age and gender did not prove significant with the FAS.

scholarly journals Performance of Brazilian children on phonemic and semantic verbal fluency tasks

2011 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 78-84 ◽  
Author(s):  
Helenice Charchat-Fichman ◽  
Rosinda Martins Oliveira ◽  
Andreza Morais da Silva
Keyword(s):  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Age Groups ◽  
International Studies ◽  
Semantic Fluency ◽  
Phonemic Fluency ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Positive Correlations ◽  
Effect Of Age ◽  
Fluency Task ◽  
Brazilian Children

Abstract The most used verbal fluency paradigms are semantic and letter fluency tasks. Studies suggest that these paradigms access semantic memory and executive function and are sensitive to frontal lobe disturbances. There are few studies in Brazilian samples on these paradigms. Objective: The present study investigated performance, and the effects of age, on verbal fluency tasks in Brazilian children. The results were compared with those of other studies, and the consistency of the scoring criteria data is presented. Methods: A sample of 119 children (7 to 10 years old) was submitted to the three phonemic fluency (F, A, M) tasks and three semantic fluency (animals, clothes, fruits) tasks. The results of thirty subjects were scored by two independent examiners. Results: A significant positive correlation was found between the scores calculated by the two independent examiners. Significant positive correlations were found between performance on the semantic fluency task and the phonemic fluency task. The effect of age was significant for both tasks, and a significant difference was found between the 7- and 9-year-old subjects and between the 7- and 10-year-old subjects. The 8-year-old group did not differ to any of the other age groups. Conclusion: The pattern of results was similar to that observed in previous Brazilian and international studies.

scholarly journals Comparing the semantic networks of children with cochlear implants and children with typical hearing: Extending Kenett et al. (2013) by considering Hearing Age.

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michaela Socher ◽  
ulrika löfkvist ◽  
Malin Wass
Keyword(s):  
Cochlear Implants ◽  
Semantic Network ◽  
Semantic Networks ◽  
Spoken Language ◽  
Chronological Age ◽  
Perceptual Quality ◽  
Semantic Fluency ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Significant Difference ◽  
Fluency Task

Purpose: Kenett et al. (2013) report that the sematic network of children with CI is less structured compared to the sematic network of children with TH. This study aims to evaluate if such differences are only evident if children with CI are compared to children with TH matched on chronological age, or also if they are compared to children with TH matched on hearing age. Method: The performance of a group of children with CI on a verbal fluency task was compared to the performance of a group of chronological-age matched children with TH. Subsequently, computational network analysis was used to compare the semantic network structure of the groups. The same procedure was applied to compare a group of children with CI to a group of hearing-age matched children with TH. Results: Children with CI performed significantly more poorly than children with TH matched on chronological age on a semantic fluency task and exhibited a significantly less structured semantic network. No significant difference in performance on a semantic fluency task was found between children with CI and children with TH matched on hearing-age. However, the structure of the semantic network differed significantly for the hearing age matched groups. Conclusions: Although the groups perform on the same level on a sematic fluency task, the semantic network for spoken language of children with CI is less structured compared to children with TH matched on hearing age. Reasons for this might be differences in the (perceptual) quality and the quantity of spoken language input.

scholarly journals Semantic, phonologic, and verb fluency in Huntington's disease

2007 ◽  
Vol 1 (4) ◽  
pp. 381-385 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariana Jardim Azambuja ◽  
Monica Santoro Haddad ◽  
Marcia Radanovic ◽  
Egberto Reis Barbosa ◽  
Letícia Lessa Mansur
Keyword(s):  
Executive Functioning ◽  
Huntington's Disease ◽  
Huntington’S Disease ◽  
Task Performance ◽  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Frontal Lobe Dysfunction ◽  
Semantic Fluency ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Usual Evaluation ◽  
Fluency Task

Abstract Verbal fluency tasks have been identified as important indicators of executive functioning impairment in patients with frontal lobe dysfunction. Although the usual evaluation of this ability considers phonologic and semantic criteria, there is some evidence that fluency of verbs would be more sensitive in disclosing frontostriatal physiopathology since frontal regions primarily mediate retrieval of verbs. Huntington's disease usually affects these circuitries. Objective: To compare three types of verbal fluency task in the assessment of frontal-striatal dysfunction in HD subjects. Methods: We studied 26 Huntington's disease subjects, divided into two subgroups: mild (11) and moderate (15) along with 26 normal volunteers matched for age, gender and schooling, for three types of verbal fluency: phonologic fluency (F-A-S), semantic fluency and fluency of verbs. Results: Huntington's disease subjects showed a significant reduction in the number of words correctly generated in the three tasks when compared to the normal group. Both controls and Huntington's disease subjects showed a similar pattern of decreasing task performance with the greatest number of words being generated by semantic elicitation followed by verbs and lastly phonologic criteria. We did not find greater production of verbs compared with F-A-S and semantic conditions. Moreover, the fluency of verbs distinguished only the moderate group from controls. Conclusion: Our results indicated that phonologic and semantic fluency can be used to evaluate executive functioning, proving more sensitive than verb fluency. However, it is important to point out that the diverse presentations of Huntington's disease means that an extended sample is necessary for more consistent analysis of this issue.

Introducing the Tactual Span: A New Task for Assessing Working Memory in the Teactile Modality

Assessment ◽  
2020 ◽  
pp. 107319112094992
Author(s):  
Eyal Heled ◽  
Shulamit Rotberg ◽  
Roman Yavich ◽  
A. Dan Hoofien
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Selective Attention ◽  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Semantic Fluency ◽  
Attention Task ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Span Tasks ◽  
Tactile Modality ◽  
Fluency Task ◽  
Skewness And Kurtosis

The span paradigm is commonly used to assess working memory (WM), predominantly through the visual and auditory routes and less often through the tactile modality. The current study aimed to validate the “Tactual Span”, a new task developed to evaluate WM in the tactile modality. Participants were 140 healthy young adults, who performed the Tactual Span alongside span tasks in three additional modalities (auditory, visual, and visuospatial), as well as a selective attention task and a semantic verbal fluency task. The Tactual Span and other span tasks were found to correlate, while correlations with the selective attention and semantic fluency tasks were largely nonsignificant, indicating good construct validity. Cronbach’s alpha for both stages as well as skewness and kurtosis were also adequate. An exploratory factor analysis for the forward stage showed that the Tactual Span and Visuospatial Span were loaded on one factor, whereas the Auditory and Visual Spans were loaded on another factor. In the backward stage, all span tasks were loaded on a single factor. The findings provide an initial indication that the Tactual Span task is a feasible and valid tool for assessing WM in the tactile modality.

scholarly journals A Toolkit for Analyzing Strategy Use in Phonemic Verbal Fluency Tasks preprint

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brandon Mackey ◽  
Sara Sims ◽  
Kristina Visscher ◽  
David E. Vance
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Assessment ◽  
Verbal Fluency ◽  
Cognitive Strategies ◽  
Strategy Use ◽  
Verbal Fluency Task ◽  
Automated Pipeline ◽  
Phonemic Verbal Fluency ◽  
Average Size ◽  
Fluency Task ◽  
Word Cluster

The phonemic verbal fluency task is a common cognitive assessment of language and executive functioning which asks participants to list as many words as they can that begin with a given letter. Verbal fluency tasks are widely used to identify deficits in verbal fluency, which have been associated with disorders such as schizophrenia and dementia. Verbal fluency tasks are scored by the number of correct responses, however analysis of “clusters” of related words within a response list can give insights into the cognitive strategies used by participants. Unfortunately, manual word cluster analysis is time and labor intensive and inconsistent, since raters may cluster words differently depending on how they themselves have phonetically categorized the words. We present an automated pipeline for quantification of strategy use in the phonemic verbal fluency task, “LetterVF”. LetterVF is a python module (i.e., a script containing useful functions, which can be imported and used in other scripts) that uses a pronunciation dictionary to convert verbal fluency task data items into lists of phonemes, which can be analyzed to identify clusters of words that share similarities in any of several clustering categories. Additionally, LetterVF contains useful functions for identifying intrusions (words which do not follow the rules for the task), identifying perseverations (responses repeated within the same trial), counting the number of cluster switches in a list, and calculating the average size of clusters for a list. Analysis of data from 50 participants’ verbal fluency task responses indicated that analysis using LetterVF yields accuracy and consistency on par with manual analysis. Our hope is that this tool will allow researchers to get more out of their datasets, and explore new topics related to cognitive strategy use, such as how strategies change with age and differences in strategies between experimental groups.

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