There are a seemingly endless number of health risks that increase with age, but for many of us, none are as scary as the prospect of cognitive decline. And while the symptom can be harrowing enough on its own, it's often a sign of dementia and Alzheimer's disease. With that in mind, you likely want to know your risk factors and any early indicators. Many of these have been well documented, but researchers are still learning more. And a Nov. 2023 study published in Aging, Neuropsychology, and Cognition has identified a speech pattern that might be a warning sign of cognitive decline.
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Researchers from the academic health sciences center Baycrest and the University of Toronto looked at speech as a predictor of cognitive decline. Word-finding difficulty (WFD) is often flagged as a potential indicator, but this also appears to be a normal sign of aging. How fast or slow you talk, on the other hand, might be a more definitive red flag.
"Our results indicate that changes in general talking speed may reflect changes in the brain," lead study author Jed Meltzer, PhD, Baycrest’s Canada Research Chair in Interventional Cognitive Neuroscience, said in a press release. "This suggests that talking speed should be tested as part of standard cognitive assessments to help clinicians detect cognitive decline faster and help older adults support their brain health as they age."
The study is one of the first to examine both talking speed and WFD in adults, evaluating 125 participants between the ages of 18 and 90.
Study participants completed three assessments, including a picture-naming game. In this assessment, they answered questions about pictures while trying to ignore distracting words being played through headphones. For example, they may have been shown a photo of a mop and asked if it ends in "p" while their headphones said a word like "broom," the press release explains.
"In this way, the researchers were able to test the participants' ability to recognize what the picture was and to recall its name," the release notes.
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The second assessment gave participants one minute to describe two "complex pictures" (60 seconds for each picture). Artificial intelligence (AI) analyzed their speaking speed and pauses. Standard tests were the third assessment, evaluating mental abilities like executive function.
After completing the three assessments, researchers weren't surprised to find that WFD, among other abilities, decreased with age. What did surprise them was that the declining ability to recognize and recall the name of something in a picture was not associated with a decline in other mental abilities. In addition, pauses when finding words weren't linked to brain health.
"Instead, how fast participants were able to name pictures predicted how fast they spoke in general, and both were linked to executive function. In other words, it wasn’t pausing to find words that showed the strongest link to brain health, but the speed of speech surrounding pauses," the press release states.
Consequently, researchers posit that the slowing down of normal speech could be a more important indicator of cognitive decline than not being able to come up with a word for something.
The connection requires future study, and researchers suggest conducting the same tests with the same participants over several years to determine whether speech speed is truly a predictive factor.
