The Gaze-Gait Connection: Assessing Alzheimer's Severity Through Gaze Behaviors

This study explores the use of eye-tracking (ET) technology as an aid tool in the diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). A group of participants, consisting of subjects diagnosed with AD and healthy controls, performed walking tasks enriched with auditory and visual stimuli while wearing ET glasses. The main objective was to assess whether visual behavior data could be a useful parameter in the diagnosis of the condition. To this end, the presence of differences between the two groups was preliminarily analyzed in order to define a solid starting point for possible diagnostic use. The analysis focused on two main parameters: elevation and azimuth of gaze. Results showed that the elevation parameter was particularly effective in detecting alterations in visual attention associated with AD, while azimuth proved to be less discriminating. Tasks based on visual stimuli provided more significant data than acoustic ones, probably due to the simplicity of the proposed auditory rhythm (60 bpm), In addition, a correspondence was observed between scores obtained on the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB), suggesting a potential integrated approach for classifying disease severity. Overall, the results highlight the potential of eye-tracking as an objective tool to support cognitive and motor assessment in AD diagnostic protocols.