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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Aging Neurosci.
Sec. Neurocognitive Aging and Behavior
Volume 17 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnagi.2025.1516932
This article is part of the Research Topic Artificial Intelligence-based Diagnosis and Neuromodulation in Neurological and Psychiatric Diseases View all articles

Auditory steady state response can predict declining EF in healthy elderly individuals

Provisionally accepted
Xiaopeng Mao Xiaopeng Mao 1Nelly Shenton Nelly Shenton 2Martin Johannes Lauritzen Martin Johannes Lauritzen 3Sadasivan Kumaran Puthusserypady Sadasivan Kumaran Puthusserypady 1KRISZTINA BENEDEK KRISZTINA BENEDEK 2*
  • 1 Department of Health Technology, Technical University of Denmark, Lyngby, Denmark
  • 2 Zealand Universityhospital, Roskilde, Denmark
  • 3 Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Capital Region of Denmark, Denmark

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Background: The aging population imposes significant economic and societal challenges, underscoring the need for early detection of individuals at risk of cognitive decline prior to the onset of clinical symptoms. This study explores the association between gamma-band Auditory Steady-State Responses (ASSRs) and subclinical cognitive decline using longitudinal data from healthy volunteers in the Metropolit Birth Cohort (MBC). Methods: Longitudinal recordings of cognitive test results and ASSRs at 40 Hz stimulation were analyzed. Generalized Linear Models (GLMs) were employed to determine the association between ASSR characteristics and cognitive performance with an emphasis on Executive Function (EF) at ages 61-68. Additionally, Vision Transformers (ViTs) were trained to distinguish between individuals with declining and stable cognitive performance. Results: Subjects with declining cognitive performance through midlife showed a larger area of entrainment and delayed neural assembly of ASSRs compared to those with stable cognitive performance. These neurophysiological changes were correlated with poorer EF, as measured by the Stockings of Cambridge (SOC) task. The ViTs trained and cross-validated on time-frequency-transformed Electroencephalograms (EEGs) achieved an average cross-subject accuracy of 51.8 % in identifying cognitive decline. Conclusion: Gamma-band ASSR characteristics are linked to early cognitive decline in middle-aged individuals, offering potential as biomarkers. However, the limited predictive accuracy of ML models emphasizes the need for further refinement to enhance their clinical applicability.

    Keywords: electroencephalogram (EEG), Auditory steady state response (ASSR), gamma-band, cognitive decline, Executive function (EF), and Machine Learning (ML)

    Received: 25 Oct 2024; Accepted: 13 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Mao, Shenton, Lauritzen, Puthusserypady and BENEDEK. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: KRISZTINA BENEDEK, Zealand Universityhospital, Roskilde, Denmark

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.