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Author Topic:   Predictive Alzheimer's Test
Percy
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Posts: 22473
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.7


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Message 1 of 5 (884294)
02-07-2021 11:06 AM


The NYT ran an article about a test that predicts who might get Alzheimer's: Alzheimer’s Prediction May Be Found in Writing Tests - The New York Times. It uses analysis of writing samples. Here's the example from the article:
The two examples of impaired writing are pretty bad. I would consider anyone who wrote like that already impaired, but according to the article the people who wrote that way presented as normal. That hardly seems possible.
I wondered what I might have written about that drawing, so here it is:
A boy is falling off a stool as he reaches for cookies on a high shelf. The stool has only three legs, very unusual for a stool of that height. He has a cookie in his left hand and has just grabbed a cookie with his right. A girl, probably his sister, stands next to the stool reaching for the cookie in his left hand and doesn't seem to realize that he's falling. The drawing of her face and right hand is indistinct so possibly she's just beginning to register concern, but it seems more likely she's eating a cookie.
Meanwhile the mother is busy washing dishes completely oblivious to the cookie theft and the water overflowing the sink. At this particular moment she is drying a dish. Water overflowing the sink seems unlikely given that almost all sinks have an overflow drain. The water is overflowing the sink far faster than any faucet could ever fill it. What is this woman preoccupied with? Given the absurdity of the drawing I'll guess she's worried about body snatchers, or possibly has already been snatched.
The cabinet with the cookies is weirdly otherwise empty. The handle on the cabinet door to the left is way too high and would never be placed there, plus if that door is as wide as the adjacent doors then the handle is in the middle of the door instead of on the edge. There are no visible door handles on the lower cabinet doors, which are far too wide. There's no kick space at floor level below the cabinets. The countertop is empty except for a few dishes. No range, cooktop, oven, fridge or appliance of any kind, large or small, is visible. There's no dishwashing liquid visible.
The single kitchen window above the sink is open and appears wider than the maximum reasonable width for a double hung window. The view of the yard and another part of the house outside the window appears normal, unlike the chaos and implausibility in the kitchen.
The mother may be wearing heels, and the drawing looks out of the 1950's.
In 10 years I'll try again and compare.
--Percy

Replies to this message:
 Message 2 by Stile, posted 02-09-2021 8:38 AM Percy has seen this message but not replied

  
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