Cognitive illnesses such as Alzheimer‘s are devastating, for those who suffer from them and their families, and science has spent billions attempting to alleviate and even reverse the symptoms and the consequences. But now scientists are trying a different approach, to find the markers before the illness even appears, and they are doing that by looking at the way we speak well before we develop any illnesses.
The thing is, we all forget words sometimes, it is not uncommon for us to just blank on simple words when we are distracted, tired, stressed or just not having the greatest day memory wise. This is called lethologica and it is common at every age, but it is a lot more common as we get older.
Most people believe this is one of the markers that has historically been looked at as a sign of future cognitive issues, but in reality, this has nothing to do with whether or not we will develop Alzheimer’s, it is another marker entirely.
How our speech might signal that we are prone to cognitive diseases like Alzheimer’s
A new study out of the University of Toronto looked into which signs could indicate a decline in cognitive function and found that how fast someone talks might actually be a better clue about what is going on with our brains.
In the study, 125 adults ranging from 18 to 90 years old were asked to describe a picture and their recordings were run through AI software that measured metrics like how quickly they spoke, how long they paused, and how diverse their word choice was. The participants also took tests that measured thinking speed, focus, and the ability to plan or carry out tasks.
What stood out was that speech speed was closely tied to how well people performed on these cognitive tests, as it not only indicated how quickly we found the descriptor words in our brain, but also how quickly our brain could keep up with talking in general. By doing this they saw a correlation between slow speech and a broader decline in executive functions.
One fascinating part of the study involved a task meant to separate the process of picking a word from actually saying it and to do it researchers used a technique called “picture-word interference”. This involved participants being shown images of objects while hearing a word out loud that was either similar in meaning or in sound to confuse them. This was meant to trip them up a little and see how quickly they could still name the object.
The result was clear, older adults who spoke more slowly in everyday speech also took longer to come up with the names during this task suggesting a decline in processing speed.
Of course this study is just a very small part of what it takes to process cognitive decline, describing pictures is not the same as real life scenarios, and verbal fluency tasks would be better to figure out how well someone’s language abilities are holding up. People with neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s often struggle with these tests as they engage a bunch of different parts of the brain and can point out where issues might be starting.
Researchers have also found that how people feel about their own word-finding struggles is a great first step, as frustration can be an indicator that the person is finding the task harder. Most of us just laugh it off when we get the “tip-of-the-tongue” feeling when trying to remember a word or concept, but we know it will come to us. Those experiencing cognitive decline tend to be more frustrated and feel worse about the situation.