Reduced specificity of functional connectivity in the aging brain during task performance

Geerligs, Linda; Maurits, Natasha M.; Renken, Remco; Lorist, Monicque M.

doi:10.1002/hbm.22175

Cited by 177 publications

(183 citation statements)

References 52 publications

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“…In older adults, increased activity (Buckner, 2004; Cabeza, Anderson, Locantore, & McIntosh, 2002; Reuter‐Lorenz et al., 2000) or connectivity (Campbell, Grady, Ng, & Hasher, 2012; Davis, Dennis, Daselaar, Fleck, & Cabeza, 2008; Geerligs, Maurits, Renken, & Lorist, 2014) is often considered to be compensatory in nature. The recruitment of additional brain regions or increased connectivity between brain regions has been suggested to support the maintenance of cognitive function which would otherwise be disrupted due to age‐related brain changes, such as loss of gray matter or reductions in within‐network connectivity.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thalamic functional connectivity and its association with behavioral performance in older age

et al. 2018

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IntroductionDespite the thalamus’ dense connectivity with both cortical and subcortical structures, few studies have specifically investigated how thalamic connectivity changes with age and how such changes are associated with behavior. This study investigated the effect of age on thalamo‐cortical and thalamo‐hippocampal functional connectivity (FC) and the association between thalamic FC and visual–spatial memory and reaction time (RT) performance in older adults.MethodsResting‐state functional magnetic resonance images were obtained from younger (n = 20) and older (n = 20) adults. A seed‐based approach was used to assess the FC between the thalamus and (1) sensory resting‐state networks; (2) the hippocampus. Participants also completed visual–spatial memory and RT tasks, from the Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery (CANTAB).ResultsOlder adults exhibited a loss of specificity in the FC between sensory thalamic subregions and corresponding sensory cortex. Greater thalamo‐motor FC in older adults was associated with faster RTs. Furthermore, older adults exhibited greater thalamo‐hippocampal FC compared to younger adults, which was greatest for those with the poorest visual–spatial memory performance.ConclusionAlthough older adults exhibited poorer visual–spatial memory and slower reaction times compared to younger adults, “good” and “poorer” older performers exhibited different patterns of thalamo‐cortical and thalamo‐hippocampal FC. These results highlight the potential role of thalamic connectivity in supporting reaction times and memory in aging. Furthermore, these results highlight the importance of including the thalamus in studies of aging to fully understand how brain changes with age may be associated with behavior.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Thalamic functional connectivity and its association with behavioral performance in older age

et al. 2018

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“…2011; Antonenko and Flöel 2014; Geerligs et al. 2014) and segregation of functional networks with age (Oldfield 1971; Chan et al. 2014).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dominant hemisphere functional networks compensate for structural connectivity loss to preserve phonological retrieval with aging

Agarwal

Stamatakis

Geva³

et al. 2016

Brain and Behavior

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IntroductionLoss of hemispheric asymmetry during cognitive tasks has been previously demonstrated in the literature. In the context of language, increased right hemisphere activation is observed with aging. Whether this relates to compensation to preserve cognitive function or dedifferentiation implying loss of hemispheric specificity without functional consequence, remains unclear.MethodsWith a multifaceted approach, integrating structural and functional imaging data during a word retrieval task, in a group of younger and older adults with equivalent cognitive performance, we aimed to establish whether interactions between hemispheres or reorganization of dominant hemisphere networks preserve function. We examined functional and structural connectivity on data from our previously published functional activation study. Functional connectivity was measured using psychophysiological interactions analysis from the left inferior frontal gyrus (LIFG) and the left insula (LINS), based on published literature, and the right inferior frontal gyrus (RIFG) based on our previous study.ResultsAlthough RIFG showed increased activation, its connectivity decreased with age. Meanwhile, LIFG and LINS connected more bilaterally in the older adults. White matter integrity, measured by fractional anisotropy (FA) from diffusion tensor imaging, decreased significantly in the older group. Importantly, LINS functional connectivity to LIFG correlated inversely with FA.ConclusionsWe demonstrate that left hemispheric language areas show higher functional connectivity in older adults with intact behavioral performance, and thus, may have a role in preserving function. The inverse correlation of functional and structural connectivity with age is in keeping with emerging literature and merits further investigation with tractography studies and in other cognitive domains.

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“…The default network is activated during social or internally-directed cognitive processes, including access to stored knowledge representations and experiences [65] and is typically suppressed during performance of externally-directed tasks [115]. Age-related changes include reduced suppression [112,116,117] and decreased within-network connectivity during both task [110,113,118] and rest [108,109,119,120]. Recent evidence also suggests that the default network is more functionally connected to other brain networks in aging [113,114,[119][120][121][122] and this connectivity is poorly modulated by task context [96,97,[122][123][124].…”

Section: Changes In Functional Brain Networkmentioning

confidence: 99%

Structure and function of the aging brain

Spreng¹,

Turner²

2018

Preprint

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In this opening section of the Aging Brain we set the stage for the contributions that follow by providing a broad overview of the latest advances in our understanding of how the brain changes, both structurally and functionally, across the adult lifespan. We leave domain-specific aspects of brain aging to the subsequent chapters, where contributors will provide more targeted accounts of brain change germane to their particular focus on the aging brain. Here we review the extant, and rapidly expanding literature to provide a brief overview and introduction to structural and functional change that occur with typical brain aging. We begin the chapter by looking back, to review some of the early discoveries about how the brain changes across the adult lifespan. We close the chapter by looking forward, towards new discoveries that challenge our core assumptions about the inevitability or irreversibility of age-related brain changes. These sections serve as bookends for the core of the chapter where we review the latest research advances that continue to uncover the mysteries of the aging brain. Spreng, R.N., Turner, G.R. (2019, forthcoming) Structure and function of the aging brain. In G Samanez-Larkin (Ed.) The aging brain. Washington DC: American Psychological Association.

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Reduced specificity of functional connectivity in the aging brain during task performance

Cited by 177 publications

References 52 publications

Thalamic functional connectivity and its association with behavioral performance in older age

Thalamic functional connectivity and its association with behavioral performance in older age

Dominant hemisphere functional networks compensate for structural connectivity loss to preserve phonological retrieval with aging

Structure and function of the aging brain

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