The Human Neurodiversity Laboratory

The most consistent and pronounced factor that affects the cognitive abilities of older adults is a decline in processing speed, or the rate at which people can perform a task.  Links between processing speed and changes in frontal lobe cortex, which appear to be mediated in part by cerebral vessel disease, have been reported previously.  Similar results are presented in our recent Frontiers of Human Neuroscience paper, as well as evidence that age-related changes in cerebellar cortex uniquely predict age-related changes in processing speed.  Cerebellar cortex did not appear to be substantially affected by vessel disease, suggesting different mechanisms for cerebellar and frontal changes that affect processing speed.  These results are important because potential lifestyle and intervention programs designed to limit the effects of aging on cognition could have greater efficacy by targeting distinct cerebellar and frontal systems.

Changes in auditory temporal processing are thought to be one reason why older adults have difficulty recognizing speech, especially in difficult listening conditions. Dr. Kelly Harris reports in the journal Hearing Research that changes in auditory temporal processing can be explained, in part, by changes in cognitive processing speed. Processing speed is the [...]

The Neurodiversity Lab is this year’s recepient of the Deafness Research Foundation Centurion Clinical Research Award to study the plasticity of neural systems that process orthography and phonology in older adults.

Findings show speech recognition problems independent of hearing loss
Washington, DC May 12, 2009 – Older adults may have difficulty understanding speech because of age-related changes in brain tissue, according to new research in the May 13 issue of The Journal of Neuroscience. The study shows that older adults with the most difficulty understanding spoken words [...]