An aspect of sentence processing in Alzheimer's disease: quantifier-noun agreement

Neurology. 1995 Jan;45(1):85-91. doi: 10.1212/wnl.45.1.85.

Abstract

We assessed sentence processing in Alzheimer's disease (AD) with measures of sentence-picture matching, grammaticality judgments of sentences, and sentence completion. The results demonstrated significant and consistent difficulty with a grammatical feature of sentences on all three experiments. This impairment could not be explained by factors such as sentence length, dementia severity, or a short-term memory deficit and was independent of difficulty interpreting the meanings of words. We hypothesize that AD patients are impaired at appreciating the conceptual relations that underlie certain grammatical features of sentences.

Publication types

  • Clinical Trial
  • Comparative Study
  • Controlled Clinical Trial
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Aged
  • Alzheimer Disease / psychology*
  • Education
  • Humans
  • Language*
  • Memory, Short-Term
  • Neuropsychological Tests
  • Speech
  • Visual Perception