Relationship among Story-retelling Ability, Naming and Memory in Healthy Elderly Adults

Objectives: Cognitive decline due to aging is known to decrease discourse production in healthy elderly adults. The purpose of this study was to analyze the correlation among story retelling, naming, and memory abilities in healthy elderly adults, and to investigate the influence of these abilities on story retelling ability. Methods: Fifty-four healthy elderly people participated in the study and performed tests of story retelling, confrontational naming, verbal fluency, subjective memory, and verbal memory. Results: First, the percentage of correct responses in the confrontational naming task and the number of correct responses in the supermarket items and letter categories of the verbal fluency task were significantly correlated with the information unit (IU) analysis scale of story retelling. Second, the score of subjective memory, as well as the immediate and delayed recall scores of the verbal memory tasks were significantly correlated with all scales of the IU analysis. Finally, the regression analysis confirmed that the number of correct responses of the supermarket items, subjective memory, and delayed recall scores had a significant effect on story retelling ability. Conclusion: The present study utilized IU analysis to identify the association between story retelling, naming and memory abilities, and these results are significant in that they provide an important basis for clinical assessment and intervention strategy development.