Multimodal analysis of synchronization data from patients with dementia

Little is known about the abilities of people with dementia to synchronize bodily movements to music. The lack of non-intrusive tools that do not hinder patients, and the absence of appropriate analysis methods may explain why such investigations remain challenging. This paper discusses the development of an analysis framework for processing sensorimotor synchronization data obtained from multiple measuring devices. The data was collected during an explorative study, carried out at the University Hospital of Reims (F), involving 16 individuals with dementia. The study aimed at testing new methods and measurement tools developed to investigate sensorimotor synchronization capacities in people with dementia. An analysis framework was established for the extraction of quantity of motion and synchronization parameters from the multimodal dataset composed of sensor, audio, and video data. A user-friendly monitoring tool and analysis framework has been established and tested that holds potential to respond to the needs of complex movement data handling. The study enabled improving of the hardware and software robustness. It provides a strong framework for future experiments involving people with dementia interacting with music

Persistent fluctuations in stride intervals under fractal auditory stimulation

Copyright @ 2014 Marmelat et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.Stride sequences of healthy gait are characterized by persistent long-range correlations, which become anti-persistent in the presence of an isochronous metronome. The latter phenomenon is of particular interest because auditory cueing is generally considered to reduce stride variability and may hence be beneficial for stabilizing gait. Complex systems tend to match their correlation structure when synchronizing. In gait training, can one capitalize on this tendency by using a fractal metronome rather than an isochronous one? We examined whether auditory cues with fractal variations in inter-beat intervals yield similar fractal inter-stride interval variability as isochronous auditory cueing in two complementary experiments. In Experiment 1, participants walked on a treadmill while being paced by either an isochronous or a fractal metronome with different variation strengths between beats in order to test whether participants managed to synchronize with a fractal metronome and to determine the necessary amount of variability for participants to switch from anti-persistent to persistent inter-stride intervals. Participants did synchronize with the metronome despite its fractal randomness. The corresponding coefficient of variation of inter-beat intervals was fixed in Experiment 2, in which participants walked on a treadmill while being paced by non-isochronous metronomes with different scaling exponents. As expected, inter-stride intervals showed persistent correlations similar to self-paced walking only when cueing contained persistent correlations. Our results open up a new window to optimize rhythmic auditory cueing for gait stabilization by integrating fractal fluctuations in the inter-beat intervals.Commission of the European Community and the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research

Humour processing in frontotemporal lobar degeneration: A behavioural and neuroanatomical analysis.

Humour is a complex cognitive and emotional construct that is vulnerable in neurodegenerative diseases, notably the frontotemporal lobar degenerations. However, humour processing in these diseases has been little studied. Here we assessed humour processing in patients with behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia (n = 22, mean age 67 years, four female) and semantic dementia (n = 11, mean age 67 years, five female) relative to healthy individuals (n = 21, mean age 66 years, 11 female), using a joint cognitive and neuroanatomical approach. We created a novel neuropsychological test requiring a decision about the humorous intent of nonverbal cartoons, in which we manipulated orthogonally humour content and familiarity of depicted scenarios. Structural neuroanatomical correlates of humour detection were assessed using voxel-based morphometry. Assessing performance in a signal detection framework and after adjusting for standard measures of cognitive function, both patient groups showed impaired accuracy of humour detection in familiar and novel scenarios relative to healthy older controls (p < .001). Patient groups showed similar overall performance profiles; however the behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia group alone showed a significant advantage for detection of humour in familiar relative to novel scenarios (p = .045), suggesting that the behavioural variant syndrome may lead to particular difficulty decoding novel situations for humour, while semantic dementia produces a more general deficit of humour detection that extends to stock comedic situations. Humour detection accuracy was associated with grey matter volume in a distributed network including temporo-parietal junctional and anterior superior temporal cortices, with predominantly left-sided correlates of processing humour in familiar scenarios and right-sided correlates of processing novel humour. The findings quantify deficits of core cognitive operations underpinning humour processing in frontotemporal lobar degenerations and suggest a candidate brain substrate in cortical hub regions processing incongruity and semantic associations. Humour is a promising candidate tool with which to assess complex social signal processing in neurodegenerative disease

Normes pour un corpus musical

Summary : Norms for a musical corpus. In this article, we present norms for a standardized set of 144 melodie excerpts. The melodies have been standardized on four variables corresponding to familiarity, verbal evocations, musical categories (vocal or instrumental) and age of acquisition. For this purpose, estimations were obtained in 120 French university students. The results show that musical excerpts can be submitted to psychometric measures similar to normative measures obtained for other stimuli. Except for the age of acquisition which was only determined for a limited number of excepts, the other variables such as familiarity, musical category as well as verbal responses associated to each musical except were identified. The present results extend data obtained in a previous investigation with the same set of melodies infrench speaking subjectsfrom Quebec by Peretz et her colleagues (1995). This study provides a standardized set of melodies available for research in the psychology of music. Key words : norms, music, familiarity, verbal associations.Résumé Dans cet article sont présentés les résultats d'une étude de norme pour un corpus de 144 extraits musicaux. Des estimations relatives à la familiarité, à l'évocation verbale, à la catégorisation musicale et à l'âge d'acquisition ont été recueillies auprès de 120 sujets universitaires français. Les résultats ont montré que les extraits musicaux pouvaient être soumis à des mesures psychométriques comparables aux mesures normatives effectuées sur d'autres stimuli. Mis à part l'âge d'acquisition qui n'a pu être déterminé que pour un nombre limité d'extraits, les autres variables telles que la familiarité, la catégorisation vocale ou instrumentale ainsi que la nature des évocations verbales associées à chaque extrait musical ont pu être identifiées. Ce travail, qui vient compléter les données recueillies à partir du même corpus de mélodies sur la population francophone québécoise par Peretz et al. (1995), met à la disposition des chercheurs un matériel musical standardisé permettant d'harmoniser les recherches en psychologie de la musique menées auprès de francophones. Mots-clés : normes, musique, familiarité, associations verbales.Ehrlé Nathalie, Samson Séverine, Peretz Isabelle. Normes pour un corpus musical. In: L'année psychologique. 2001 vol. 101, n°4. pp. 593-616

Dissociation of emotional processes in response to visual and olfactory stimuli following frontotemporal damage

International audienc

"I have to translate the colors" :description and implications of a genuine case of phoneme color synaesthesia

The aim of the paper was to document further the case of VA who possesses colored speech sound synesthesia. To do so, different stimuli were presented to VA: isolated vowels, nonsense syllables, and words. VA systematically perceived a color for each phoneme and we observed that only the articulatory and acoustic factors linked with changes in phonemic category influenced the colors perceived. Semi-structured interviews indicated that in the context of conversation, VA had to translate color into phonemes into her constructed linguistic representations which has a cognitive cost. She also reported having a visual cognitive style in which the verbal dimension is almost non-existent. This is the first time that genuine phoneme color synesthesia has been described. In the discussion, we address several implications of this synesthesia: the cognitive cost of this stable system, the atypical speech perception that it implies, and its relation to a specific cognitive functioning

When synesthesia and savant abilities are mistaken for hallucinations and delusions: contribution of a cognitive approach for their differential diagnosis

International audienceObjective: Schizophrenia is characterized by hallucinations, delusions, disorganized speech and behavior, and other symptoms that cause social or occupational dysfunction. However, some of these symptoms, such as hallucinations and delusions, can be indicative of other phenomena such as synesthesia and savant abilities. The aim of this paper is to highlight how neurological and psychiatric conditions can be confused and how formal neuropsychological evaluations can be necessary to distinguish them.Method: We report the case of a young woman, VA, who perceived sounds as colors and claimed to have elaborated complex astrophysical reasoning, despite having experienced difficulties at school, especially in mathematics. VA also had difficulties to orient herself, to develop social relationships, and often became confused by daily life situations. These elements were considered as symptoms of schizophrenia.Results: Evaluations revealed that VA exhibited savant abilities in astrophysics and colored-hearing synesthesia. We also found evidence of higher-than-average cognitive functioning.Conclusions: In complex cases, neuropsychological and formal evaluations are necessary to establish a differential diagnosis. Moreover, the case highlights the link between synesthesia and savant abilities

Efficacy of Musical Interventions in Dementia: Methodological Requirements of Nonpharmacological Trials

The management of patients with Alzheimer\u27s disease is a significant public health problem given the limited effectiveness of pharmacological therapies combined with iatrogenic effects of drug treatments in dementia. Consequently, the development of nondrug care, such as musical interventions, has become a necessity. The experimental rigor of studies in this area, however, is often lacking. It is therefore difficult to determine the impact of musical interventions on patients with dementia. As part of a series of studies, we carried out randomized controlled trials to compare the effectiveness of musical activities to other pleasant activities on various functions in patients with severe Alzheimer\u27s disease. The data obtained in these trials are discussed in light of the methodological constraints and requirements specific to these clinical studies. Although the results demonstrate the power of music on the emotional and behavioral status of patients, they also suggest that other pleasant activities (e.g., cooking) are also effective, leaving open the question about the specific benefits of music in patients with dementia. All these findings highlight the promising potential for nonpharmacological treatments to improve the well-being of patients living in residential care and to reduce caregiver burden

Test de compréhension écrite complexe de Chapman-Cook : meilleures performances pour les participants âgés en comparaison des plus jeunes pour les niveaux d’études inférieurs au baccalauréat

International audienc