Beijing City Key Lab for Medical Physics and Engineering, Institute of Heavy Ion Physics, School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing, China; Center for MRI Research, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China.
Beijing City Key Lab for Medical Physics and Engineering, Institute of Heavy Ion Physics, School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing, China; Center for MRI Research, Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing, China.
Brain Lang. 2020 Feb;201:104713. doi: 10.1016/j.bandl.2019.104713. Epub 2019 Nov 20.
Language communication is crucial throughout the lifespan. The current study investigated how aging affects the brain network subserving intelligible speech. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, we compared brain responses to intelligible and unintelligible speech between older and young adults. Univariate and multivariate analyses revealed reduced brain activation and lower regional pattern distinctions in response to intelligible versus unintelligible speech in the left anterior superior temporal gyrus (aSTG) and the left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) in the older compared with young adults. Notably, the functional connectivity between the left IFG and the left angular gyrus (AG) was increased and a significantly enhanced bidirectional effective connectivity between the left aSTG and the left AG was observed in the older adults for processing speech intelligibility. Our study revealed aging-related differences in the cortical activity for intelligible speech and suggested that increased frontal-temporal-parietal functional integration may help facilitate spoken language processing in older adults.
语言交流贯穿人的一生。本研究旨在探讨衰老如何影响大脑处理可理解言语的网络。我们采用功能磁共振成像技术，比较了老年人和年轻人对可理解和不可理解言语的大脑反应。单变量和多变量分析显示，与年轻人相比，老年人在左前上颞回(aSTG)和左额下回(IFG)对可理解言语的反应中，大脑激活减少，区域模式差异降低。值得注意的是，老年人在处理言语可理解性时，左 IFG 与左角回(aAG)之间的功能连接增加，左 aSTG 与左 aAG 之间的双向有效连接显著增强。本研究揭示了与衰老相关的可理解言语的皮质活动差异，并表明增加额颞顶叶功能整合可能有助于老年人处理口语。
