PMID- 34929110
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20220324
LR  - 20220324
IS  - 1558-9102 (Electronic)
IS  - 1092-4388 (Linking)
VI  - 65
IP  - 1
DP  - 2022 Jan 12
TI  - Is Old Age Just a Number in Language Skills? Language Performance and Its 
      Relation to Age, Education, Gender, Cognitive Screening, and Dentition in Very 
      Old Finnish Speakers.
PG  - 274-291
LID - 10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00178 [doi]
AB  - PURPOSE: This study reports on how very old (VO) Finnish people without dementia 
      perform in the Western Aphasia Battery (WAB) and two verbal fluency tasks and 
      which demographic factors predict the performance. METHOD: The study included 
      fifty 80- to 100-year-old community-dwelling Finnish speakers with no dementing 
      illnesses or speech-language disabilities, who completed the WAB and two verbal 
      fluency tasks. Multifactorial statistical analyses with recursive partitioning 
      were carried out to determine the significant predictors out of five predictor 
      variables (age, gender, education, dentition, and Mini-Mental State Examination 
      [MMSE]) for four response variables (WAB Aphasia Quotient [AQ], Language Quotient 
      [LQ], semantic, and phonemic word fluencies). RESULTS: Overall, individual 
      variation was notable in VO speakers. All predictor variables were statistically 
      significantly associated with one or more of the language skills. Age was the 
      most significant predictor; the critical age of 85-86 years was associated with a 
      decline in WAB-AQ and semantic fluency. Poor dentition and the MMSE score both 
      predicted a decline in WAB-LQ and phonemic fluency. A high level of education was 
      positively associated with the skills of the best-performing individuals in 
      WAB-AQ, WAB-LQ, and semantic fluency. CONCLUSIONS: VO age is a significant factor 
      contributing to language performance. However, a younger age, a good cognitive 
      performance, intact teeth, and a higher educational level also seem to have a 
      preservative power as regards language skills. Gender differences should be 
      interpreted with caution. The results of this study provide culture- and 
      language-specific normative data, which aids in differentiating typical aging 
      from the signs of acute or degenerative neuropathology to ensure appropriate 
      medical and therapeutic interventions.
FAU - Alantie, Sonja
AU  - Alantie S
AUID- ORCID: 0000-0002-2090-2023
AD  - Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, 
      Finland.
AD  - Speech-Language Pathology, Tampere University Hospital, Finland.
FAU - Tyrkko, Jukka
AU  - Tyrkko J
AUID- ORCID: 0000-0001-5251-5338
AD  - Department of Languages, Linnaeus University, Vaxjo, Sweden.
FAU - Makkonen, Tanja
AU  - Makkonen T
AUID- ORCID: 0000-0001-6358-5876
AD  - Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, 
      Finland.
AD  - Speech-Language Pathology, Tampere University Hospital, Finland.
FAU - Renvall, Kati
AU  - Renvall K
AUID- ORCID: 0000-0002-3329-4602
AD  - Department of Psychology and Speech-Language Pathology, University of Turku, 
      Finland.
AD  - Department of Cognitive Science, Macquarie University, Sydney, New South Wales, 
      Australia.
LA  - eng
PT  - Journal Article
PT  - Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
DEP - 20211220
PL  - United States
TA  - J Speech Lang Hear Res
JT  - Journal of speech, language, and hearing research : JSLHR
JID - 9705610
SB  - IM
MH  - Aged, 80 and over
MH  - Cognition/physiology
MH  - *Dentition
MH  - Educational Status
MH  - Finland
MH  - Humans
MH  - *Language
EDAT- 2021/12/21 06:00
MHDA- 2022/03/25 06:00
CRDT- 2021/12/20 20:11
PHST- 2021/12/21 06:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2022/03/25 06:00 [medline]
PHST- 2021/12/20 20:11 [entrez]
AID - 10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00178 [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - J Speech Lang Hear Res. 2022 Jan 12;65(1):274-291. doi: 
      10.1044/2021_JSLHR-21-00178. Epub 2021 Dec 20.