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Early detection of amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) is crucial for early intervention. The Loewenstein-Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference and Learning (LASSI-L) identify risk for cognitive decline by measuring proactive semantic interference (PSI). PSI correlates with critical Alzheimer’s disease (AD) biomarkers, predicting decline. A digital version of the LASSI™, the LASSI-D™, was highly convergent with the LASSI-L in older participants. We developed three alternative forms of the LASSI-D™, examining convergence across forms and retest changes, to evaluate utility as a repeated-measure

The three digital alternative forms of the LASSI™ (LASSI-D™) were highly convergent with each other and the LASSI-L. The findings provide evidence of the utility of a cloud-based, self-administered cognitive challenge test with alternative forms.

This study reports on the development and initial validation of a self-administered computerized version of the Loewenstein-Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference (LASSI), the digital LASSI (LASSI-D). A self-administered digital version, with an artificial intelligence–generated avatar assistant, was the migrated assessment.

The results for the digital migration of the LASSI-D were highly convergent with the legacy LASSI-L. Across all indices of similarity, including sensitivity, criterion validity, classification accuracy, and performance, the versions converged across languages. The current data provide convincing evidence of the use of a fully self-administered digitally migrated cognitive challenge test.

Huntington’s disease (HD) is characterized by progressive cognitive decline, with early deficits often preceding motor symptoms. The Loewenstein-Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference and Learning (LASSI-L) captures many types of deficits in verbal memory including susceptibility to interference. The current study aims to delineate the progression of these deficits across different stages of HD.

The LASSI-L appears to be a useful tool for detecting early and progressive cognitive changes in Huntington’s disease, particularly by capturing the sequential nature of verbal memory deficits, including early vulnerability to interference. These findings suggest that the LASSI-L may help refine HD staging by integrating sequential neuropsychological markers of cognitive decline.

Proactive Semantic Interference (PSI) and failure to recover from PSI (frPSI), are novel constructs assessed by the LASSI-L. These measures are sensitive to cognitive changes in early Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and preclinical AD determined by Aβ load using PET. The goal of this study was to compare a new computerized version of the LASSI-L (LASSI-Brief Computerized) to the standard paper-and-pencil version of the test.

Overall, the LASSI-BC was comparable, and in some ways, superior to the paper-and-pencil LASSI-L. Advantages of the LASSI-BC include a more standardized administration, suitability for remote assessment, and an automated scoring mechanism that can be verified by a built-in audio recording of responses.

This study investigated the role of proactive semantic interference (frPSI) in predicting the progression of amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI) to dementia, taking into account various cognitive and biological factors.

These findings after adjustment for demographic and biological markers of Alzheimer’s Disease, suggest that assessing frPSI may offer valuable insights into the risk of dementia progression in individuals with aMCI.

This study investigated the role of proactive semantic interference (frPSI) in predicting the progression of amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI) to dementia, taking into account various cognitive and biological factors.

These findings after adjustment for demographic and biological markers of Alzheimer’s Disease, suggest that assessing frPSI may offer valuable insights into the risk of dementia progression in individuals with aMCI.

The Loewenstein-Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference and Learning (LASSI-L), has shown promising diagnostic properties for the diagnosis of Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and dementia. LASSI-L may also be efficient in predicting cognitive decline in at-risk individuals. There is an unmet need to examine the diagnostic properties of the LASSI-L in a Danish context where traditional neuropsychological tests are typically applied when diagnosing possible dementia disorders.  LASSI-L had high reliability and promising predictive value in the diagnosis of aMCI and mild AD due to AD.

The objective was to determine whether the increased vulnerability to semantic interference previously observed in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) is specifically associated with semantic material or if it also affects other types of material, suggesting generalized executive and inhibitory impairment.

The results suggest that aMCI present with broad difficulties in source memory and inhibition, but that impaired deep semantic processing results in additional semantic intrusion errors during proactive interference and impacts their ability to show good recall after an interference list (greater semantic retroactive interference).

In this study, the focus was on expanding previous work by determining whether a digitized cognitive stress test, the Loewenstein-Acevedo Scales for Semantic Interference and Learning, Brief Computerized Version (LASSI-BC) could differentiate between Cognitively Unimpaired (CU) and amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment (aMCI) groups. A second focus was to correlate LASSI-BC performance to volumetric reductions in AD-prone brain regions.

Results indicated that, even after adjusting for initial learning ability, the failure to recover from proactive semantic interference (frPSI) on the LASSI-BC differentiated between CU and aMCI groups. Further, frPSI on the LASSI-BC was associated with volumetric reductions in the hippocampus, amygdala, inferior temporal lobes, precuneus, and posterior cingulate.

Cognitive decline is an important early sign in premotor manifest Huntington’s disease (preHD) and is characterized by deficits across multiple domains including executive function, psychomotor processing speed, and memory retrieval. Prior work suggested that the Loewenstein-Acevedo Scale for Semantic Interference and Learning (LASSI-L)–a verbal learning task that simultaneously targets these domains – could capture early cognitive changes in preHD. The current study aimed to replicate, validate and further analyze the LASSI-L in preHD using larger datasets.

The study found that LASSI-L is a sensitive, reliable, efficient tool for detecting cognitive decline in preHD.