Dataset Information

Successful Working Memory Processes and Cerebellum in an Elderly Sample: A Neuropsychological and fMRI Study.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Imaging studies help to understand the evolution of key cognitive processes related to aging, such as working memory (WM). This study aimed to test three hypotheses in older adults. First, that the brain activation pattern associated to WM processes in elderly during successful low load tasks is located in posterior sensory and associative areas; second, that the prefrontal and parietal cortex and basal ganglia should be more active during high-demand tasks; third, that cerebellar activations are related to high-demand cognitive tasks and have a specific lateralization depending on the condition.

Methods

We used a neuropsychological assessment with functional magnetic resonance imaging and a core N-back paradigm design that was maintained across the combination of four conditions of stimuli and two memory loads in a sample of twenty elderly subjects.

Results

During low-loads, activations were located in the visual ventral network. In high loads, there was an involvement of the basal ganglia and cerebellum in addition to the frontal and parietal cortices. Moreover, we detected an executive control role of the cerebellum in a relatively symmetric fronto-parietal network. Nevertheless, this network showed a predominantly left lateralization in parietal regions associated presumably with an overuse of verbal storage strategies. The differential activations between conditions were stimuli-dependent and were located in sensory areas.

Conclusion

Successful WM processes in the elderly population are accompanied by an activation pattern that involves cerebellar regions working together with a fronto-parietal network.

SUBMITTER: Luis EO

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4488500 | biostudies-literature | 2015

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Successful Working Memory Processes and Cerebellum in an Elderly Sample: A Neuropsychological and fMRI Study.

Luis Elkin O EO Arrondo Gonzalo G Vidorreta Marta M Martínez Martin M Loayza Francis F Fernández-Seara María A MA Pastor María A MA

PloS one 20150701 7

<h4>Background</h4>Imaging studies help to understand the evolution of key cognitive processes related to aging, such as working memory (WM). This study aimed to test three hypotheses in older adults. First, that the brain activation pattern associated to WM processes in elderly during successful low load tasks is located in posterior sensory and associative areas; second, that the prefrontal and parietal cortex and basal ganglia should be more active during high-demand tasks; third, that cerebe ...[more]

PMID: 26132286

Similar Datasets

Project description:Recent neuroimaging studies have reported an age-related reduction in brain activations in response to working memory load in task-sensitive brain regions. The current fMRI study investigated the age-related differences in brain activations of the updating mechanism in working memory, which was not investigated in previous studies. With a hybrid block/event-related design, this study was able to examine changes in BOLD signals (i.e., neuromodulation) to increase in updating, a type of cognitive control that is understudied. Older adults were separated into young-old and old-old cohorts to examine whether, within healthy aging, the neuromodulation to cognitive control decreases with age. Our results show that younger adults activate left precentral gyrus and right cerebellum more during trials that require updating than trials that do not require updating. Although older adults showed reduced neuromodulation in these two regions, the old-old cohort failed to show any significant neuromodulation in response to updating. Moreover, older adults not only showed reduced suppressions of the default mode network (DMN) regions during the task, they also overactivated some of the DMN regions, esp. the old-old, when compared to the younger adults. Older adults also showed overactivations in a region (right precentral gyrus) that is contralateral to a task-sensitive region that was activated in the younger adults during updating. Brain-behavior correlations suggest that age-related overactivations of these DMN regions and the right precentral gyrus are maladaptive to their performance. Our results suggest that not only the neuromodulation in response to updating demands is diminished in healthy aging, older adults also show maladaptive increases in activations of task-irrelevant regions and reduced hemispheric specificity during updating. These effects are most pronounced in old-old cohort, compared to young-old, suggesting that age-related declines in neuromodulation during cognitive control is more pronounced in older cohorts within healthy aging.

Dataset Information

Successful Working Memory Processes and Cerebellum in an Elderly Sample: A Neuropsychological and fMRI Study.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusion

Publications

Successful Working Memory Processes and Cerebellum in an Elderly Sample: A Neuropsychological and fMRI Study.

Similar Datasets

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