Goh Joshua O S
Beckman Institute, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. USA.
Aging Dis. 2011 Jan 1;2(1):30-48.
Aging is associated with myriad changes in behavioral performance and brain structure and function. Given this complex interplay of brain and behavior, two streams of findings are reviewed here that show that aging is generally associated with dedifferentiated neural processes, and also changes in functional connectivity. This article considers an integrated view of how such age-related dedifferentiation of neural function and changes in functional connectivity are related, highlighting some recent findings on differences in small-world architecture in the functional connectivity of young and older adults. These findings suggest that both neural connectivity and the organization of these connections are important determinants of processing efficiency with aging that may be the underlying mechanisms for dedifferentiation. Thus, the evaluation of the neurocognitive effects of aging on functional connectivity provides an alternative framework that captures the behavioral and brain changes that are observed in cognitive aging.
衰老与行为表现、大脑结构和功能的无数变化相关。鉴于大脑与行为之间这种复杂的相互作用，本文回顾了两方面的研究结果，这些结果表明衰老通常与神经过程去分化以及功能连接的变化有关。本文探讨了一个综合观点，即神经功能的这种与年龄相关的去分化和功能连接的变化是如何相关的，重点介绍了一些关于年轻人和老年人功能连接中小世界架构差异的最新研究结果。这些研究结果表明，神经连接及其组织方式都是衰老过程中处理效率的重要决定因素，可能是去分化的潜在机制。因此，评估衰老对功能连接的神经认知影响提供了一个替代框架，用以捕捉认知衰老中观察到的行为和大脑变化。
