Linguistic features from recall tests detect cognitive impairment

In 710 older adults from the Long Life Family Study, researchers analyzed digital voice recordings from logical memory tests. The cohort included 598 individuals with normal cognition and 112 with cognitive impairment. Investigators built linguistic polyfeature scores from weighted sums of speech characteristics captured during immediate and delayed paragraph recall.

Twelve linguistic features and higher summary scores were associated with cognitive impairment, with odds ratios of 1.05 for immediate recall and 1.07 for delayed recall. The delayed recall score approached the classification accuracy of traditional scoring, yielding an AUC-PR of 0.77 compared to 0.81. Higher delayed recall scores were also associated with lower cognitive screener performance over an average of 7 years of follow-up.