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Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

uoc.edu

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Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#11

Post by diqwndwqiond »

ip26 wrote: post #8
trimbo wrote: post #3

> They recruited 63 healthy individuals, 135 patients with mild cognitive impairment such as memory loss, and 68 people with Alzheimer's – the most prevalent type of dementia – in four hospitals in Barcelona and the metropolitan area Wait so, N = 266? All from Barcelona? C'mon.

With proper random sampling you only need something like N = 27 (I forget exactly) to reach p = 0.05 Assuming random sampling, it's a misconception that you need ten thousand participants to have a useful study.

It seems that his objection is he "homogeneity" of the population, they're all from Barcelona, if the sample had different locations I think he wouldn't object the small number( e.g N = 30 ).

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#12

Post by 7thaccount »

roenxi wrote: post #4

Interesting and suggestive, but difficult to interpret from the publicly available information. Actively speaking two languages no doubt implies complex correlations between wealth, status and circumstance. The paper abstract doesn't mention controlling for location. That would also be an interesting thing to test.

Or just not being someone born in the USA to non first generation parents.

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#13

Post by andy_ppp »

trimbo wrote: post #3

> They recruited 63 healthy individuals, 135 patients with mild cognitive impairment such as memory loss, and 68 people with Alzheimer's – the most prevalent type of dementia – in four hospitals in Barcelona and the metropolitan area Wait so, N = 266? All from Barcelona? C'mon.

Yes, I haven’t read the paper but how can you control for correlated stuff here, e.g. bilingual people are likely to be richer, more intelligent, exercise more, eat better more varied food and have richer social lives. Maybe.

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#14

Post by kingkawn »

7thaccount wrote: post #12
roenxi wrote: post #4

Interesting and suggestive, but difficult to interpret from the publicly available information. Actively speaking two languages no doubt implies complex correlations between wealth, status and circumstance. The paper abstract doesn't mention controlling for location. That would also be an interesting thing to test.

Or just not being someone born in the USA to non first generation parents.

The study is in Spain.

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#15

Post by another1oror »

trimbo wrote: post #3

> They recruited 63 healthy individuals, 135 patients with mild cognitive impairment such as memory loss, and 68 people with Alzheimer's – the most prevalent type of dementia – in four hospitals in Barcelona and the metropolitan area Wait so, N = 266? All from Barcelona? C'mon.

Another from Italy with 85 people that found the same

https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/news/2018-05-15/bilingual-brai...

This one appears to have brain scans to suggest structural differences do exist

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#17

Post by drdrey »

andy_ppp wrote: post #13
trimbo wrote: post #3

> They recruited 63 healthy individuals, 135 patients with mild cognitive impairment such as memory loss, and 68 people with Alzheimer's – the most prevalent type of dementia – in four hospitals in Barcelona and the metropolitan area Wait so, N = 266? All from Barcelona? C'mon.

Yes, I haven’t read the paper but how can you control for correlated stuff here, e.g. bilingual people are likely to be richer, more intelligent, exercise more, eat better more varied food and have richer social lives. Maybe.

Are immigrants and their children likely to be richer, eat better, etc?

Re: Actively speaking two languages protects against cognitive impairment

#18

Post by mdtancsa »

pmichaud wrote: post #6
diqwndwqiond wrote: post #2

Is it correlation or causation tho?

On priors and given how they sample, I'm guessing it's just p-hacking.

I cant find the episode now, but a few years ago an episode CBC's science show Quirks and Quarks interviewed a researcher that found being bilingual seemed to delay the onset of dementia by a couple of years. Although it doesnt sound like much, from a public policy pov, its pretty significant when you look at what that can mean for quality of life as well as costs for our public health system.
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