title: Temporal changes in semantic and lexical access related to mild cognitive impairment.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  It has been hypothesized that the deterioration in the ability to name famous people in normal aging and cognitive impairment is a continuum in which meaning-based representations and form-based representations are differentially impaired, with early impairments in lexical access but not in semantic access.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  This hypothesis is tested in a follow-up study comparing the performance of fifty-six participants with amnestic mild cognitive impairment and forty-one control participants were assessed.
  
  
  METHODS
  A lexical task was conducted involving recognition and naming of famous people from photographs. Proportional semantic and phonological access measures were calculated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Comparisons revealed significant differences between baseline and follow-up, with improvements in semantic access in the control group and decrements in phonological access in the group with amnestic mild cognitive impairment. Phonological access and reaction time measures were significantly and positively correlated, and semantic access and reaction time were significantly and negatively correlated.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results add evidence to the hypothesis that the decrease of processing resources is related to the increase of difficulties in lexical access throughout aging. Patterns of change must be replicated over longer periods of time.
authors: Departamento de Psicoloxía Evolutiva e da Educación, Facultade de Psicoloxía, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, rúa Xosé María Suárez Núñez, s/n. Campus vida, 15782, Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain. david.facal@usc.es.
authors: David
authors: D
authors: Facal
authors: Departamento de Psicoloxía Evolutiva e da Educación, Facultade de Psicoloxía, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, rúa Xosé María Suárez Núñez, s/n. Campus vida, 15782, Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain.
authors: Onésimo
authors: O
authors: Juncos-Rabadán
authors: Departament de Metodologia de les Ciències del Comportament, University of Barcelona, Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
authors: Joan
authors: J
authors: Guardia-Olmos
authors: Departamento de Psicoloxía Evolutiva e da Educación, Facultade de Psicoloxía, Universidade de Santiago de Compostela, rúa Xosé María Suárez Núñez, s/n. Campus vida, 15782, Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain.
authors: Arturo X
authors: AX
authors: Pereiro
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D060825:Cognitive Dysfunction / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D010700:Phonetics; D011930:Reaction Time; D012660:Semantics; D014706:Verbal Learning
keywords: Language production; Lexical access; Mild cognitive impairment; Verbal fluency