Reading latency of words and nonwords in Alzheimer's patients

Contrasting data on reading ability in Alzheimer's disease patients have be en reported in the literature. Recently Patterson, Graham and Hedges (1994) found that irregular words were misread by demented subjects, while regula r words were read correctly. The present study hypothesizes that reading la tency may be a sensitive measure of Alzheimer's patients reading impairment . Fifteen Alzheimer's patients were compared with 17 elderly normal subject s on three tasks that used the same set of concrete, regular words: a pictu re naming task, a word-picture matching task and a word-nonword reading tas k. The results of the study indicate that reading latency is longer in Alzh eimer's patients than in normal subjects, and that misnamed and mismatched words are read with the same mechanism as nonwords.