Word-Finding Behaviors of Discourse Production Task in Healthy Elderly Adults

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate whether there is a difference in word-finding behaviors in the discourse production task according to the age group of the elderly, from the young-old to the old-old. Methods: A total of 103 healthy elderly adults (55 to 85 years old) participated in this study. To exanimation of word-finding behaviors in the discourse, a picture description task was used. And, as the word naming task, the confrontational naming and the verbal fluency tasks were used. Results: First, according to the age group, the difference in the ratio of wordfinding behaviors were statistically significant. Especially, there were significant differences according to the age group of the elderly in word-finding behaviors of repetitions, empty words, insertions, and delays. Second, the difference in performances of word naming task (Korean version-Boston Naming Test and semantic verbal fluency) according to the age group of the elderly was found to be significant. Finally, the performance of the word naming task showed a significant correlation with the ratio of word-finding behaviors in the discourse production task. Conclusion: This study has clinical significance in that it analyzed various word-finding behaviors in a natural environment where the problem of naming appears in elderly adults.