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39/100

✓ Peer-reviewed alzhub usefulness score 39 out of 100. Digital health tools

Topic: Risk, prevention and care in population studies

Plain-language summary

Patients with Huntington's Disease (HD) who were without dementia were compared to unilateral stroke patients and controls as previously reported in 1983, to discover if they had a prosodic defect. Subjects were presented tape-recorded speech filtered sentences and asked to indicate the tone of voice as happy, sad or angry (affective prosody), or as a question, command or statement (propositional prosody). HD patients were impaired in comprehension of both types of prosody compared to controls but were not different from stroke patients. A second study compared early HD patients with at-risk siblings and spouse controls on comprehension of affective and propositional prosody, discrimination of both types of prosody, rhythm discrimination and tonal memory (Seashore tests). HD patients were impaired in both comprehension and discrimination of all types of prosody. HD patients were less accurate than at-risk patients on the tonal memory task but not on the rhythm discrimination task. These findings suggest compromise in ability to understand the more subtle prosodic aspects of communication which may contribute to social impairment of HD patients very early in the course of the disease.

What this study adds

Evidence grade: Low

Patients with Huntington's disease who did not have dementia were impaired at understanding both emotional and grammatical aspects of tone of voice compared with controls. This is about Huntington's disease and does not address treating, curing or preventing Alzheimer's disease.

Taken from this record’s own fields, not from reading the paper. The grade is assigned from the abstract’s wording; what that means.

Cite this study APA, Vancouver, BibTeX · download .bib or .ris

APA 7th

Speedie, L. J., Brake, N., Folstein, S. E., Bowers, D., & Heilman, K. M. (1990). Comprehension of prosody in Huntington's disease. Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry. https://doi.org/10.1136/jnnp.53.7.607

Vancouver

Speedie LJ, Brake N, Folstein SE, Bowers D, Heilman KM. Comprehension of prosody in Huntington's disease. Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry. 1990. doi:10.1136/jnnp.53.7.607. PMID: 2144017.

BibTeX

@article{speedie1990-2144017,
  author  = {Speedie, L. J. and Brake, N. and Folstein, S. E. and Bowers, D. and Heilman, K. M.},
  title   = {{Comprehension of prosody in Huntington's disease}},
  journal = {Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry},
  year    = {1990},
  doi     = {10.1136/jnnp.53.7.607},
  pmid    = {2144017},
  url     = {https://doi.org/10.1136/jnnp.53.7.607}
}

Built from the record alzhub holds for this paper, not looked up. Volume, issue and page numbers are not held in the record. Check the citation against the original before you use it.

How to read this study

Design: our record does not state a study design, so check the methods section of the original before weighing the result.
Size: the record gives no participant count. Look for one in the original before trusting a pattern.
Effect: the record gives no effect size, so the summary above cannot say how large any difference was.

What the evidence grade means here

This page is graded low. alzhub.org assigns the grade automatically from keywords in the abstract, not from reading the paper. Low means the abstract matched neither pattern. It is the default label, and it does not mean the work is poor; many sound lab and imaging papers land here. It can add at most 5 of the 100 points in the study score, and it is a label about design, not a verdict on whether the findings are true.

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Key findings

Patients with Huntington's Disease (HD) who were without dementia were compared to unilateral stroke patients and controls as previously reported in 1983, to discover if they had a prosodic defect.
HD patients were impaired in comprehension of both types of prosody compared to controls but were not different from stroke patients.
These findings suggest compromise in ability to understand the more subtle prosodic aspects of communication which may contribute to social impairment of HD patients very early in the course of the disease.

Why it matters

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Study details

Evidence strengthLow

How this study scored 39/100

Published in a peer-reviewed journal. Scored zero for study design, sample size, effect reported, studied in people and randomized / blinded because the record does not state it.

Component	Points	Why
Journal tier	7 / 10	Tier 3 — peer-reviewed journal (Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry)
Journal's citation record	3 / 4	Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery & Psychiatry: journal h-index 336 (OpenAlex, 2026-10-29)
Study design	0 / 12	No study design recorded — scores zero, not guessed (not stated in the record — scored 0)
Strength of evidence	1 / 5	Rated “low” in our summary
Peer-review validation	10 / 10	Peer-reviewed. Published as an article in a named peer-reviewed journal.
How recent	1 / 5	1990 — older than 20 years, still counted
Sample size	0 / 4	Participant count not stated — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0)
Effect reported	0 / 3	No effect size reported — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0)
Studied in people	0 / 3	Not stated whether this was studied in people — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0)
Randomized / blinded	0 / 2	No randomization or blinding stated — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0)
Times cited	4 / 7	Cited 92 times (OpenAlex, 2026-10-10)
Citations per year	1 / 5	2.4 citations a year over 38 year(s) since 1990
Impact for its field and year	1 / 6	Cited 1.0× the average for papers of its field and year (OpenAlex FWCI)
Cited by studies here	1 / 6	Cited by 1 other studies in this library
Still being cited	1 / 4	Cited 3 times in 2024–2026 (2026 still in progress; OpenAlex)
Senior author's track record	4 / 4	Last-listed author Kenneth M. Heilman: h-index 103 (OpenAlex, whole career)
Institution's track record	2 / 3	Johns Hopkins University: institution h-index 2,306 (OpenAlex)
Multicenter collaboration	1 / 3	OpenAlex lists 3 institution(s) in 2 countries
Indexed in PubMed	2 / 2	Indexed in PubMed (PMID 2144017)
Free to read	0 / 2	Behind a paywall — scores zero
Total	39 / 100	—

What each of these 20 components measures, and what this score is not →

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