Date: March 27-30, 2025

Place: NH Ventas (Madrid)

Event: XVI congreso Nacional de Neuropsicología

Co-authored and presented a poster titled “Bilingüismo y cognición: el impacto de la competencia y uso del lenguaje en adultos mayores sanos”. The poster was developed in collaboration with Gonzalo Sánchez-Benavides, Oriol Grau-Rivera, Miguel Santos-Santos, Laia Subirats, Ferran Prados and Marco Calabria.

The presentation focused on the impact of bilingualism on the cognition of cognitively healthy older adults, aged 45 to 70, who are part of the Alzheimer’s and Families (ALFA) study. To this end, we considered the participants’ diverse bilingual experiences based on their age of acquisition, proficiency level, and active lifelong use of Catalan and Spanish.

Date: 12/05/2025

Place: UOC Edifici C

Summary: PhD student Francesco Ciongoli and I delivered a presentation to all attendees of the Brain Awareness Week session, hosted by Dr. Marco Calabria, Dr. Elena Muñoz, Dr. Juan Luis Garcia and Dr. Ferran Prados. Our presentation focused on the various methodologies used in our lab for neuroimaging acquisition and brain stimulation. We provided a live demonstration of a transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) montage, along with real-time acquisition of functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy (fNIRS) data.

This year, we began sharing the initial findings of the thesis at national and international conferences and symposiums. Participating in these academic events offers invaluable opportunities for both professional and personal development. The process of preparing and submitting abstracts has strengthened academic writing skills, improving the ability to clearly communicate complex research ideas. Additionally, presenting research findings through posters and oral presentations helps improve public speaking and scientific communication skills.

So far, we have attended the annual Spanish meeting in the field of Neuropsychology (FANPSE). Engaging with keynote lectures and panel discussions has been especially inspiring, as it provides valuable insights into the latest advancements in the field and helps contextualize our research within the broader academic landscape.

This Folio post is a summary of the research activities I participated in this academic year outside my doctoral studies or research plan. All the collaborations are with other members of the NeuroADaS Lab:

• Non-invasive neuromodulation intervention on patients diagnosed with post-COVID19 syndrome at Consorci Sanitari de Terrassa (CST). Project name: «Remote intervention based on non-invasive neuromodulation in post-COVID19 syndrome. Addressing cognitive impairments and fatigue». 
• I conducted a non-invasive neuromodulation intervention on residents of the Suances residence (Cantabria), administering two sessions per day over 10 days, with pre- and post-intervention cognitive evaluations. Additionally, I was responsible for data compilation and analysis for our research group.
• General tasks as a laboratory technician: laboratory inventory, support in laboratory doctoral research, management of laboratory spaces and materials, presentation activities of the laboratory to external individuals such as the mayor and deputy mayor as well as the new rector and vice-rectors or doctoral students, among others.
• I conducted cognitive assessments of children aged 10 to 12 from three different schools as part of the PEANUTY project by the Gasol Foundation. The assessment included the d2-R test, Stroop Test, Symbol Search, Picture Span, Digit Span and Coding subtests of the WISC-V, and Raven’s-2 test. This year, we also carried out post-evaluations for some of the children, allowing us to begin correcting pre- and post-assessments. I was responsible for compiling and analysing preliminary results for a pre-post analysis.

This academic year we started analysing the results from ALFA cohort. We develop a statistical analysis plan that included four steps: 1) Principal Component Analysis of Language measures (Proficiency, Age of acquisition and frequency of use of Catalan and Spanish); 2) K-means clustering of the PCA results to create groups based on Language profiles; 3) Analysis of the Variance (ANOVA) of sociodemographic and language measures of the groups obtained in the k-means clustering and 4) An Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) with multiple covariates was conducted to examine the effects of language profile clusters (3 levels) and the language of assessment (Catalan or Spanish), controlling for age, years of education, sex, and adjusted cognitive reserve score, on 13 neuropsychological test scores: (1) MMSE, (2) Semantic Fluency, (3) MBT Total Free Recall, (4) MBT Total Paired Recall, (5) MBT Total Delayed Paired Recall, (6) MBT Total Delayed Free Recall, (7) WAIS-IV Coding, (8) WAIS-IV Matrix Reasoning, (9) WAIS-IV Visual Puzzles, (10) WAIS-IV Digits Total Score, (11) Digits Direct Span, (12) Digits Indirect Span, and (13) Digits Sequential Span.

We are in the process of writing a manuscript based on these results that will be the first article of my thesis. In the process we intend to present this results as posters in several congress:

• FANPSE: Annual congress of neuropsychology in Spain (Madrid)
• ISB15: biannual symposium of bilingualism (San Sebastian)
• AAIC25: Most important conference of Alzheimer’s disease in the world (Toronto).
• FESN25: Annual European congress of neuropsychology (Leipzig)

The next step after publishing the article measuring the cognitive impact of bilingualism in healthy senior adults is to analyse neuroimaging results. We have structural, morphological and functional Magnetic Resonance Image data of a subsample of the ALFA cohort (ALFA+) already pre-processed and structured ready for the analysis. We will first study each neuroimaging result separately and then integrate the three methodologies using a Multilayer Network Analysis based on Casas-Roma et al., (2022)