The production of narrative discourse in response to animations in persons with dementia of the Alzheimer's type: Preliminary findings

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Abstract
The production of narrative discourse in response to computer-generated animations was investigated in normal controls and persons with dementia of the Alzheimer's type (DAT) in an attempt to develop a more efficient and quantifiable method of eliciting a representative discourse sample, that successfully highlights the well-documented features of discourse impairment in persons with DAT. The narrative samples produced by seven persons with DAT were compared on a variety of linguistic measures with those produced by seven healthy controls matched for age and sex. The DAT subjects showed deficits in informative content, story schema, and cohesion. The animations provided a useful means of highlighting many of the discourse deficits in DAT in a consistent, sensitive, and time-efficient way.