TY - JOUR
T1 - Semantic priming in mild cognitive impairment and healthy subjects: Effect of different time of presentation of word-pairs
AU - Guglielmi, V.
AU - Quaranta, Davide
AU - Mega, I.
AU - Costantini, E. M.
AU - Carrarini, C.
AU - Innocenti, A.
AU - Marra, Camillo
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Introduction: Semantic memory is impaired in mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Two main hypotheses about this finding are debated and refer to the degradation of stored knowledge versus the impairment of semantic access mechanisms. The aim of our study is to evaluate semantic impairment in MCI versus healthy subjects (HS) by an experiment evaluating semantic priming. Methods: We enrolled 27 MCI and 20 HS. MCI group were divided, according to follow up, into converters-MCI and non converters-MCI. The semantic task consisted of 108 pairs of words, 54 of which were semantically associated. Stimuli were presented 250 or 900 ms later the appearance of the target in a randomized manner. Data were analyzed using factorial ANOVA. Results: Both HS and MCI answered more quickly for word than for non-word at both stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) intervals. At 250 ms, both MCI and HS experienced a shorter time of response for relatedword than for unrelated words (priming effect), while only the converters-MCI subgroup lost the priming effect. Further, we observed a rather larger Cohen’s d effect size in non converters-MCI than in converters-MCI. Conclusion: Our data, and in particular the absence of a semantic priming effect in converters-MCI, could reflect the impairment of semantic knowledge rather than the accessibility of semantic stores in MCI individuals that progress to dementia.
AB - Introduction: Semantic memory is impaired in mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Two main hypotheses about this finding are debated and refer to the degradation of stored knowledge versus the impairment of semantic access mechanisms. The aim of our study is to evaluate semantic impairment in MCI versus healthy subjects (HS) by an experiment evaluating semantic priming. Methods: We enrolled 27 MCI and 20 HS. MCI group were divided, according to follow up, into converters-MCI and non converters-MCI. The semantic task consisted of 108 pairs of words, 54 of which were semantically associated. Stimuli were presented 250 or 900 ms later the appearance of the target in a randomized manner. Data were analyzed using factorial ANOVA. Results: Both HS and MCI answered more quickly for word than for non-word at both stimulus onset asynchrony (SOA) intervals. At 250 ms, both MCI and HS experienced a shorter time of response for relatedword than for unrelated words (priming effect), while only the converters-MCI subgroup lost the priming effect. Further, we observed a rather larger Cohen’s d effect size in non converters-MCI than in converters-MCI. Conclusion: Our data, and in particular the absence of a semantic priming effect in converters-MCI, could reflect the impairment of semantic knowledge rather than the accessibility of semantic stores in MCI individuals that progress to dementia.
KW - Alzheimer disease
KW - Mild cognitive impairment
KW - Semantic priming
KW - Alzheimer disease
KW - Mild cognitive impairment
KW - Semantic priming
UR - https://publicatt.unicatt.it/handle/10807/179163
UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/citedby.uri?partnerID=HzOxMe3b&scp=85087345569&origin=inward
UR - https://www.scopus.com/inward/record.uri?partnerID=HzOxMe3b&scp=85087345569&origin=inward
U2 - 10.3390/jpm10030057
DO - 10.3390/jpm10030057
M3 - Article
SN - 2075-4426
VL - 10
SP - 1
EP - 12
JO - Journal of Personalized Medicine
JF - Journal of Personalized Medicine
IS - 3
ER -