Japan Society for the Promotion of Science:Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research
Date (from‐to) : 2012/04 -2015/03
Author : ODAGIRI Masashi; UEDA Keita; MURAI Toshiya
The functional abilities of patients with dementia gradually decrease with the progression of the disease. To show the underlying mechanisms of such disabilities, we recruited patients with mild cognitive impairment or early Alzheimer disease (n=8; control, n=15), and studied their behavioral error, eye-movement, and fixation behavior during naturalistic actions via performance-based assessment and eye-tracker. Although we found no significant differences between groups in terms of performance time, the number of errors, or fixations during tasks, the eye movement distance during tasks was much larger in patients compared with controls, and the distribution of eye movement velocity under resting and task conditions differed between the patients and controls. Such patients may exhibit subtle differences in the way they conduct superficially independent everyday activities due to cognitive functional decline, although a larger sample is necessary to confirm this possibility.