The ASHA Leader - February 2015 - (Page 16)

reSearcH in brieF Bilingualism May Delay Clinical Manifestation of Alzheimer's A study from Ghent University in Belgium, published in Bilingualism: Language and Cognition (bit.ly/ad-bilingual) has established that the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease manifest four to five years later in bilinguals than in monolinguals. Psychologists and neurologists, led by Evy Woumans, examined 69 monolingual and 65 bilingual Belgian adults with probable Alzheimer's disease to determine the age of AD manifestation and AD diagnosis for each. They found that the age of AD manifestation was 71.5 years in monolinguals and 76.1 in bilinguals. A similar difference was found for the age of AD diagnosis-72.5 for monolinguals and 77.3 for bilinguals. Analyses controlled for other confounding factors, such as education, profession and socioeconomic status. The findings confirm previous research suggesting that bilingualism can slow cognitive aging and contribute to cognitive reserve. The researchers postulate that constantly and actively controlling two languages is like a workout for the brain, challenging the brain's gray cells and keeping them from degenerating. 16 February 2015 | THe aSHa Le aDer TBI-Related Toxic Protein Accumulation May Cause Neurodegeneration A study in the Journal of Neuroscience (bit.ly/tbi-ad) suggests that an accumulation of toxic proteins in the brains of people who have had a traumatic brain injury may be the reason they are more likely to develop certain neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer's disease. Neuromedical researchers, led by the University of Rochester's Maiken Nedergaard, postulate that TBI-like normal aging-impairs the brain's ability to clear waste, allowing proteins to spread throughout the brain and eventually reach toxic levels. The protein tau-which helps stabilize the fibers, or axons, that nerve cells send out to communicate with their neighbors-plays an important role in the long-term damage sustained by the brain after a trauma. During trauma, large numbers of these proteins shake free from the axons to drift in the space between the brain's cells. They stick to one another and, over time, form increasingly larger "tangles" that can become toxic to brain function. Under normal circumstances, the brain's waste removal system can clear stray tau. But researchers found that in the brains of mice with TBI, the trauma damaged this system. "For a long time, we have viewed neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's as a supply problem, meaning that we believed the brain was producing too much tau or amyloid beta," says Benjamin Plog, a co-author of the study. "It now appears that these conditions may ultimately be linked to a clearance problem." Social Support, Self-Concept Prove Key for Adults Who Stutter increased family support and self-esteem/self-efficacy may help improve the quality of life-defined as individuals' subjective perceptions of their satisfaction with functioning in several domains of daily life-for adults who stutter, regardless of how severe the stuttering, according to an article in the american Journal of Speech-Language Pathology (on.asha.org/ ajslp-stuttering). Oklahoma State university researcher Michael P. boyle analyzed results of a Web-based survey of 249 adults who stutter. The survey included measures of social support, empowerment, self-help support group participation, group identification and quality of life. after controlling for demographic and stuttering parameters, two factors-empowerment in the self-esteem/ self-efficacy domain and social support from family-significantly predicted quality of life. These results suggest that instilling or maintaining a client's sense of selfesteem and self-efficacy, and maximizing the client's family support, may positively influence quality of life in people who stutter, and that regardless of the stuttering severity, enhancing social support from the family and selfesteem and self-efficacy can be psychologically beneficial. http://www.bit.ly/tbi-ad http://www.bit.ly/ad-bilingual http://on.asha.org/ajslp-stuttering http://on.asha.org/ajslp-stuttering

The ASHA Leader - February 2015

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