Behavioral variant frontotemporal degeneration (bvFTD) is clinically characterized by progressive decline in social and executive domains. Previous work suggests that early lifestyle factors such as education and occupational attainment may relate to structural integrity and moderate the rate of cognitive decline in bvFTD, but the role of other cognitively stimulating activities is understudied. We sought to investigate the effect of such activities on cortical thickness (CT) in bvFTD. bvFTD patients (n=31) completed a baseline MRI scan, and informants for the patients completed the Lifetime of Experiences Questionnaire (LEQ), which measures specific activities considered to be undertaken primarily within one particular life phase, such as education (young-life), occupation (mid-life), and social/leisure activity (late-life). At baseline, linear models assessed the effect of LEQ scores from each life phase on regional CT. A subset (n=19) of patients completed longitudinal MRI, and to evaluate the association of LEQ with longitudinal rates of CT decline, we derived individualized slopes of decline using linear mixed effects models and these were related to LEQ scores from each life phase. At baseline, a higher late-life LEQ score was associated with less atrophy in bilateral superior anterior temporal regions. Longitudinally, we observed that higher late-life LEQ scores were associated with an attenuated rate of CT loss in insular cortex. Late-life LEQ score was positively associated with both relatively preserved CT early in bvFTD and a slower rate of cortical loss in regions important for social functioning. These findings suggest that social and leisure activities may contribute to a form of resilience against pathologic effects of disease.

中文翻译：

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社会和休闲活动有助于减少行为变异额颞退化的下降

行为变异额颞叶变性（bvFTD）的临床特征是社交和行政领域的逐渐减少。先前的工作表明，早期的生活方式因素，例如教育和职业素养，可能与bvFTD的结构完整性和中度认知能力下降的速度有关，但对其他认知刺激活动的作用仍未进行研究。我们试图调查这种活动对bvFTD皮质厚度（CT）的影响。bvFTD患者（n = 31）完成了基线MRI扫描，并且患者的线人完成了“生命周期调查问卷”（LEQ），该调查问卷衡量的是主要在一个特定生命阶段内进行的特定活动，例如教育（年轻时） ），职业（中年）和社交/休闲活动（晚年）。在基线时 线性模型评估了每个生命阶段的LEQ评分对区域CT的影响。一小部分（n = 19）患者完成了纵向MRI，并评估了LEQ与CT下降的纵向比率的相关性，我们使用线性混合效应模型得出了个体化的下降斜率，这些与每个生命阶段的LEQ得分相关。基线时，双侧上前颞叶区域较高的晚期LEQ评分与较少的萎缩相关。纵向上，我们观察到较高的晚期LEQ评分与岛状皮层CT丢失率降低有关。晚期LEQ评分与bvFTD早期相对保存的CT和在对社会功能重要的区域皮层丢失率降低呈正相关。