title: On the parallel deterioration of lexico-semantic processes in the bilinguals' two languages: evidence from Alzheimer's disease.
abstract: In this article we aimed to assess how Alzheimer's disease (AD), which is neurodegenerative, affects the linguistic performance of early, high-proficient bilinguals in their two languages. To this end, we compared the Picture Naming and Word Translation performances of two groups of AD patients varying in disease progression (Mild and Moderate) with that of bilingual individuals diagnosed with mild cognitive impairment (MCI). The results revealed that the linguistic deterioration caused by AD affected the two languages similarly. We also found that cognate status and word frequency were two major determinants of language performance in all three groups of participants. These results are consistent with the notion of a common neural substrate recruited to represent and process the two languages of high-proficient bilinguals.
authors.affiliation: Departament de Tecnologies de Informació i Comunicacions, Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona, Spain. costalbert@gmail.com
authors.forename: Albert
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Costa
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Calabria
authors.forename: Paula
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Marne
authors.forename: Mireia
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hernández
authors.forename: Montserrat
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Juncadella
authors.forename: Jordi
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Gascón-Bayarri
authors.forename: Alberto
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Lleó
authors.forename: Jordi
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Ortiz-Gil
authors.forename: Lidia
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Ugas
authors.forename: Rafael
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Blesa
authors.forename: Ramon
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Reñé
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000150:complications*; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D060825:Cognitive Dysfunction / Q000150:complications*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007806:Language Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D008297:Male; D008609:Mental Status Schedule; D019303:Multilingualism; D009275:Names; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010153:Paired-Associate Learning; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012660:Semantics; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D014175:Translating; D014825:Vocabulary