Naming and Seizure Lateralization in Monolingual vs Bilingual Youth with Epilepsy
Abstract number :
2.315
Submission category :
11. Behavior/Neuropsychology/Language / 11B. Pediatrics
Year :
2022
Submission ID :
2204183
Source :
www.aesnet.org
Presentation date :
12/4/2022 12:00:00 PM
Published date :
Nov 22, 2022, 05:23 AM
Authors :
Melanie Silverman, MA – Columbia University; Mary Lou Smith, PhD – University of Toronto; William MacAllister, PhD – University of Calgary; Nahal Heydari, MA – Columbia University; Robyn Busch, PhD – Cleveland Clinic; Robert Fee, PhD – Columbia University; Marla Hamberger, PhD – Columbia University
This abstract is a recipient of the Young Investigator Award
Rationale: Word finding or “naming” difficulty is a common concern among adults with left (i.e., language dominant) hemisphere epilepsy, and poor naming performance is typically associated with left hemisphere seizure onset. However, we have found that in bilingual (English second language, “ESL”) adults, English naming performance is weak in patients with right as well as left hemisphere seizures, thereby, failing to lateralize seizure onset. We have shown that, like adults, auditory description naming is impaired in monolingual (i.e., English) children with left but not right hemisphere epilepsy. We hypothesized that like adults, English naming in bilingual ESL youth would fail to show an association between naming performance and seizure lateralization.
Methods: Participants were 125 youth, 6-15-years-old, with unilateral seizure onset: 96 monolingual (mean age: 11.6 ± 2.6, 55 left hemisphere, 41 right hemisphere epilepsy) and 29 bilingual (mean age: 12.3 ± 2.6, 14 left hemisphere, 15 right hemisphere). Independent samples t-tests compared left vs. right hemisphere patients on demographic factors and test performance, including FSIQ, vocabulary (WISC/WASI), and Children’s Auditory (AN) & Visual Naming (VN) Tests: Delayed RT (i.e., > 2 s), tip-of-the-tongues (TOTs) and aggregate summary score (SS). Chi-square analyses examined classification of left vs right seizure onset based on poor naming performance (i.e., z-score ≥ 1.0).
Results: Among bilinguals, children with left and right hemisphere seizure onset did not differ in age, FSIQ, or vocabulary (all p’s > .05). Among monolinguals, patients with left and right hemisphere seizure onset did not differ in age or FSIQ, but left hemisphere patients had weaker vocabulary (8.28 ± 2.6) than right hemisphere patients (10.13 ± 3.25; t(90)=-3.03, p=0.002). As expected, among monolinguals, naming performance was weaker in patients with left (AN TOT = 1.34 ± 2.02; AN SS = -1.43 ± 2.18; VN TOT = 0.47 ± 1.23; VN SS = -0.51 ± 1.23) than right hemisphere seizure onset (AN TOT = 0.45 ± 1.05, t(85.32)=2.77, p = 0.003; AN SS = -0.51 ± 1.07, t(83.15)=-2.72, p = 0.004; VN TOT = -0.001 ± 0.93, t(94)=2.04, p = 0.022; VN SS = -0.01 ± 0.93, t(93)=-2.15, p = 0.17). Among bilinguals, naming did not differ significantly in left and right hemisphere patients (all p’s > .05). In monolinguals, results of chi-square analyses (TOT scores) showed a significantly higher proportion of patients with poor AN in the left hemisphere than right hemisphere group (AN TOT, p = 0.012), whereas no significant differences were observed in the bilingual group (p’s > .05).
Conclusions: As shown in adults, English naming assessment in bilingual ESL children with unilateral epilepsy failed to elicit the typical pattern of poor naming in left but not right hemisphere epilepsy, due to unexpected, relatively weak naming performance among right (i.e., nondominant) hemisphere epilepsy patients. Results raise questions regarding the unique processing demands of naming, and the use of English naming assessment in patients who did not learn English as a first language.
Funding: NIH NINDS R01 NS 035140 (MH)
Behavior