Reading Dynamics and Comprehension in Cognitive Aging: A Multimodal Language Resource

Claudia Marzi, Noemi Boni, Alice Todesco, Andrea Nadalini, Giorgia Albertin, Cristina Dolciotti, Paolo Bongioanni, Marcello Ferro, Fabio Tamburini, Gloria Gagliardi, Vito Pirrelli


Abstract
We introduce a novel italian language resource for the study of reading and comprehension in aging populations, combining behavioural and linguistic data from healthy controls (HC), individuals with subjective cognitive decline (SCI), participants with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI), and patients with mild dementia (CDR1). Reading performance was recorded through a finger-tracking based application during both silent and oral reading, enabling fine-grained temporal analyses at the text, token and character level. Comprehension was assessed via multiple question types (wh-, inferential, referential, and lexical). Descriptive and non-linear regression analyses informed a feature selection process, yielding temporal and comprehension-based measures that capture individual reading dynamics. These features were explored through unsupervised clustering and supervised classification to investigate their discriminative and predictive potential across cognitive profiles. The resource supports research on reading and cognitive decline, offers a reproducible protocol for large-scale data collection, and provides a foundation for developing early cognitive screening and monitoring tools or aging populations.
Anthology ID:
2026.lrec-1.204
Volume:
Proceedings of the Fifteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference
Month:
May
Year:
2026
Address:
Palma de Mallorca, Spain
Editors:
Stelios Piperidis, Núria Bel, Henk van den Heuvel, Nancy Ide, Simon Krek, Antonio Toral
Venue:
LREC
SIG:
Publisher:
ELRA Language Resource Association
Note:
Pages:
2608–2618
Language:
External URL:
https://lrec.elra.info/lrec2026-main-204
DOI:
10.63317/3wjy3a8cwnw8
Bibkey:
Cite (ACL):
Claudia Marzi, Noemi Boni, Alice Todesco, Andrea Nadalini, Giorgia Albertin, Cristina Dolciotti, Paolo Bongioanni, Marcello Ferro, Fabio Tamburini, Gloria Gagliardi, and Vito Pirrelli. 2026. Reading Dynamics and Comprehension in Cognitive Aging: A Multimodal Language Resource. In Proceedings of the Fifteenth Language Resources and Evaluation Conference, pages 2608–2618, Palma de Mallorca, Spain. ELRA Language Resource Association.
Cite (Informal):
Reading Dynamics and Comprehension in Cognitive Aging: A Multimodal Language Resource (Marzi et al., LREC 2026)
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