Identifying Cognitive Impairments with Multiple Drawing Tasks

Changes in drawing traits have been reported in people with early-stage cognitive impairments, but most studies have used a single drawing task only. In a study published recently in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease.

Researchers have found that they could classify people with normal cognition, mild cognitive impairment (MCI), and Alzheimer's disease (AD) with much greater accuracy by combining traits extracted from five different drawing tasks than by using just one or two tasks.

The researchers used five different drawing tests that capture different aspects of cognition and are commonly used when diagnosing Alzheimer's disease and mild cognitive impairment. While these tests were being performed, 22 different drawing features relating to pen pressure, pen posture, speed, and pauses were automatically analyzed per test.

The researchers then compared these features with scores from seven different tests of cognitive function, and used a computer-based program to see how well the drawing traits could be used to identify people with normal cognition, mild cognitive impairment, or Alzheimer's disease.

Surprised by how well the combination of drawing traits extracted from multiple tasks worked by capturing different, complementary aspects of cognitive impairments said researchers. The three-group classification accuracy of all five tests was 75.2%, which was almost 10% better than that of any of the tests by themselves.

In addition, the majority of the drawing features that were different between the three groups had greater changes between the normal and Alzheimer's disease subjects compared with the normal and mild cognitive impairment subjectsthis is important because mild cognitive impairment is often considered an early (and less severe) form of Alzheimer's disease.

Although this was a relatively small study, the results are encouraging, these results pave the way for better screening tests for cognitive impairments ended the researchers.

Reference: "Automated early detection of Alzheimer's disease by capturing impairments in multiple cognitive domains with multiple drawing tasks," was published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease at DOI: 10.3233/JAD-215714