Communication Partner Engagement: A Relevant Factor for Functional Outcomes in Speech-Language Therapy for Aphasic Dementia.

Objectives: Previous reports established the feasibility of a telehealth model for delivering speech-language therapy via Internet videoconferencing, which connects individuals with primary progressive aphasia (PPA) to an expert speech and language pathologist for treatment. This study reports feasibility of the same telehealth intervention in a larger set of progressive aphasia participants and explores factors potentially influencing functional intervention outcomes.

Methods: Participants with PPA or progressive aphasia in the context of a neurodegenerative dementia syndrome and their communication partners were enrolled into an 8-session intervention, with 3 evaluations (baseline, 2 months, and 6 months postenrollment).

Specificity and flexibility of social influence on spatial choice.

Rats searched for food in a situation that allowed them to determine which locations contained food after searching a small number of them, but not which of the baited locations contained more-preferred food rather than a less-preferred food. During some experimental trials, the latter information was available from the choices of model rats making choices together with the subject rats, because some of the model rats tended to choose the locations baited with more-preferred food. On the surface, the results suggest that social influence specified the locations of more-preferred food to the subject rats.

Communication Bridge: A pilot feasibility study of Internet-based speech-language therapy for individuals with progressive aphasia.

Introduction: Individuals with aphasia symptoms due to neurodegenerative dementia are under-referred for speech-language therapy (SLT) services. We sought to determine the feasibility of utilizing telepractice, via Internet video conferencing, to connect an individual with progressive aphasia due to dementia to a speech-language pathologist for treatment.

Methods: Participants received an Initial Evaluation, 8 person-centered Internet-based SLT sessions and two Post-Therapy Evaluations.

Factors modulating social influence on spatial choice in rats.

Three experiments examined the conditions under which the spatial choices of rats searching for food are influenced by the choices made by other rats. Model rats learned a consistent set of baited locations in a 5 × 5 matrix of locations, some of which contained food. In Experiment 1, subject rats could determine the baited locations after choosing 1 location because all of the baited locations were on the same side of the matrix during each trial (the baited side varied over trials).

Five on one side: personal and social information in spatial choice.

To examine whether the outcome of a rat's own choices ("personal information") and the choice behavior of another rat ("social information") can jointly control spatial choices, rats were tested in an open field task in which they searched for food. For the rats of primary interest (Subject Rats), the baited locations were all on one side of the arena, but the specific locations baited and the side on which they occurred varied over trials. The Subject Rats were sometimes tested together with an informed "Model" rat that had learned to find food in the same five locations (all on the same side of the arena) on every trial.