# Neuroimaging of Age-Related Changes in Language

> **NIH NIH R01** · PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY, THE · 2021 · $315,096

## Abstract

Project Summary / Abstract
Older adults exhibit decreased speed and accuracy in naming objects, more slips of the tongue, more
pauses in speech, and more tip-of-the-tongue experiences, in which one cannot produce a word even
though there is a vivid sense of knowing it. Importantly, older adults rank these experiences as a frustrating,
embarrassing, and frequent memory problem. While word retrieval failures reflect a common aspect of
aging that affects the vast majority of older individuals, the neural bases of language production in healthy
aging has received little attention. Research suggests that these failures result from a phonological deficit.
Indeed, results from the prior funding period demonstrated significant age-related decline and weakened
brain-behavior links underlying phonological aspects of language production. However, we have only begun
to examine the causal factors that contribute to word retrieval difficulty. Thus, the overarching goal of the
present proposal is to use behavioral measures, functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), and
diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to investigate the causal factors that contribute to age-related declines in
word retrieval. We propose a series of 5 experiments that will investigate the influence of lexical and
behavioral factors that contribute to word retrieval difficulty to advance theoretical accounts of age-related
differences in language production. The multimodal approach will allow us to examine the relations between
cognitive abilities, language production, and neural factors such as white matter integrity and functional
activation in healthy aging. Our long-term goal is to advance theoretical accounts of age-related differences
in language production. Our work is guided by the Transmission Deficit Theory (TDT), which proposes that
age weakens connections within the language system, and that age-related transmission deficits disrupt
word production more than word comprehension because of differences between the architecture of
phonological and semantic representations. This research will improve the current scientific understanding
of age-related changes in language, and provide a characterization of the neural factors that contribute to
cognitive decline. These results will provide essential information for differentiating normal age-related
changes in language from the effects of disease, forge advances in our theoretical conceptualization of age-
related differences in language, and provide insight into rehabilitative therapies for cognitive decline in both
healthy aging and clinical patients.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10170165
- **Project number:** 5R01AG034138-11
- **Recipient organization:** PENNSYLVANIA STATE UNIVERSITY, THE
- **Principal Investigator:** Michele T Diaz
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $315,096
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-09-15 → 2024-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10170165

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10170165, Neuroimaging of Age-Related Changes in Language (5R01AG034138-11). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10170165. Licensed CC0.

---

*[NIH grants dataset](/datasets/nih-grants) · CC0 1.0*