Comparação do desempenho da fluência verbal de adultos e idosos com alta escolaridade do Rio Grande do Norte

Abstract

Purpose: To compare the verbal fluency performance of adults and older adults with high educational levels from Rio Grande do Norte. Methods: Descriptive, observational, cross-sectional, and quantitative study, approved by the research ethics committee. Sixty individuals with high educational levels participated, divided into three equal age groups: Group 1 (G1), aged 20 to 39 years; Group 2 (G2), aged 40 to 59 years; and Group 3 (G3), aged 60 to 79 years. All participants signed the informed consent form and performed semantic and phonological verbal fluency tests. The total number of responses, the number of responses per second blocks, clusters, and switches were analyzed. The data were statistically analyzed with a significance level of 5%. Results: For semantic verbal fluency, the mean total score for G1 was 29.00 (± 5.91), for G2 was 25.45 (± 8.27), and for G3 was 18.85 (± 5.84). For phonological verbal fluency, the mean total score for G1 was 19.70 (± 4.33), for G2 was 19.25 (± 7.27), and for G3 was 10.95 (± 4.27). In all the parameters analyzed, no statistical difference was observed in the performance of G1 and G2, while G3 showed inferior results compared to the other groups. Conclusion: Older adults with high educational levels show lower performance in both semantic and phonological verbal fluency compared to adults, suggesting the impact of aging on these cognitive abilities, even in individuals with a high level of education