UDC

[612.821:612.822](611.81)

Authors

Emelyanova Tatyana Valeryevna, Institute of Medical and Biological Research, Northern (Arctic) Federal University named after M.V. Lomonosov (Arkhangelsk, Russia)

Abstract

We examined 78 elderly people born and permanently living in the Arkhangelsk Region. The subjects were divided into two groups according to the results of the reading efficiency test. The first group (37 people) had significantly better reading skills, with good understanding, reproduction and critical evaluation of the text; the second group (41 persons) had significantly worse reading skills (speed, text comprehension coefficient). The electroencephalographic data analysis showed that in the brain of the elderly with high reading efficiency during quiet wakefulness, the cell ensembles of the frontal and postcentral areas of the right and left hemispheres are organized into synchronized systems within the theta, alpha and beta frequency ranges. When it comes to reading, these systems are transformed into locally synchronized cell ensembles uniting the frontal, parietal, parieto-occipital and occipital regions within the theta frequency range, as well as the frontal and occipital regions within the alpha and beta frequency ranges. As a result, the integrative activity of the brain in the elderly with high reading efficiency allows it to, during the transition to cognitive activity, involve the existing synchronized contralateral neural networks in the information processing. In the subjects with low reading efficiency, only a limited number of areas were involved in synchronized neural networks both in the state of quiet wakefulness and during reading. The high level of hemispheric interaction can be seen as a compensatory mechanism providing integrative activity of the cerebral cortex when solving cognitive tasks at late stages of ontogenesis.

Keywords

hemispheric synchronization, elderly, reading efficiency, electroencephalogram.

References

1. Federmeier K.D., Kutas M. Right Words and Left Words: Electrophysiological Evidence for Hemispheric Differences in Meaning Processing. Brain Res. Cogn. Brain Res., 1999, vol. 8, no. 3, pp. 373–392. 
2. Federmeier K.D., Kutas M. A Rose by Any other Name: Long-Term Memory Structure and Sentence Processing. J. Mem. Lang., 1999, vol. 41, no. 4, pp. 469–495. 
3. Federmeier K.D., Mai H., Kutas M. Both Sides Get the Point: Hemispheric Sensitivities to Sentential Constraint. Mem. Cognit., 2005, vol. 33, no. 5, pp. 871–886. 
4. Zakharova I.A. Kompensatornyy potentsial pri normal’nom i patologicheskom starenii [Compensatory Potential in Normal and Pathological Aging]. Sistemnaya psikhologiya i sotsiologiya, 2013, no. 7(I), pp. 65–74. 
5. Ponomareva N.V., Fokin V.F., Pavlova O.A., Androsova L.V., Selezneva N.D. Analiz korrelyatsii mezhdu neyrofiziologicheskimi pokazatelyami i urovnem gormona stressa kortizola pri normal’nom starenii [Analysis of Correlation Between Neurophysiological Parameters and the Level of Cortisol Stress Hormone in Normal Ageing]. Vestnik RAMN, 1999, no. 3, pp. 46–49. 
6. Fokin V.F., Ponomareva N.V., Bukatina E.E. Neyrofiziologicheskie prediktory smerti [Neurophysiological Predictors of Death]. Uspekhi gerontologii, 1997, vol. 1, pp. 61–65. 
7. Klimesch W. Memory Processes, Brain Oscillations and EEG Synchronization. Int. J. Psychophysiol., 1996, vol. 24, no. 1-2, pp. 61–100. 
8. Borodina V.A., Borodin S.M. Monitoring kachestva chteniya v obrazovanii [Monitoring the Quality of Reading in Education]. Chelovek chitayushchiy: Homo legens, 2013, no. 5, pp. 185–197.
9. Mel’nikova T.S., Lapin I.A. Sarkisyan V.V. Obzor ispol’zovaniya kogerentnogo analiza EEG v psikhiatrii [Use of Coherent EEG Analysis in Psychiatry]. Sotsial’naya i klinicheskaya psikhiatriya, 2009, vol. 19, no. 1, pp. 90–94. 
10. Bäckman L., Ginovart N., Dixon R.A., Wahlin T.B., Wahlin A., Halldin C., Farde L. Age-Related Cognitive Deficits Mediated by Changes in the Striatal Dopamine System. Am. J. Psychiatry, 2000, vol. 157, no. 4, pp. 635–637. 
11. Davey M.P., Victor J.D., Schiff N.D. Power Spectra and Coherence in the EEG of a Vegetative Patient with Severe Asymmetric Brain Damage. Clin. Neurophysiol., 2000, vol. 111, no. 1, pp. 1949–1954. 
12. de Magalhães J.P., Sandberg A. Cognitive Aging as an Extension of Brain Development: A Model Linking Learning, Brain Plasticity and Neurodegeneration. Mech. Ageing Dev., 2005, vol. 126, no. 10, pp. 1026–1033. 
13. Lerner Y., Honey C.J., Katkov M., Hasson U. Temporal Scaling of Neural Responses to Compressed and Dilated Natural Speech. J. Neurophysiol., vol. 111, no. 12, pp. 2433–2444. 
14. Wingfield A., Grossman M. Language and the Aging Brain: Patterns of Neural Compensation Revealed by Functional Brain Imaging. J. Neurophysiol., vol. 96, no. 6, pp. 2830–2839.