MoCA Language 2 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: On the MoCA, the fluency task asks the patient to name as many words as possible beginning with a specific letter in one minute. Which letter is used?
- F (Correct answer)
- S
- A
- P
Correct answer: F
The MoCA phonemic fluency task uses the letter F, asking patients to generate words starting with that letter in 60 seconds.
Question 2: How many words must a patient correctly name in the MoCA letter fluency task to earn the full point?
- 11 or more (Correct answer)
- 7 or more
- 15 or more
- 5 or more
Correct answer: 11 or more
Patients must produce 11 or more correct words starting with the letter F in 60 seconds to score 1 point on MoCA fluency.
Question 3: In the MoCA naming task, which type of animals are presented as line drawings for identification?
- Low-familiarity animals (Correct answer)
- Common household pets
- Farm animals
- Endangered species
Correct answer: Low-familiarity animals
The MoCA uses line drawings of less common animals (lion, camel, rhinoceros) to test confrontational naming with low-familiarity stimuli.
Question 4: A patient names a lion correctly but calls the camel a 'horse.' What does this error pattern suggest clinically?
- Possible semantic paraphasia or mild anomia (Correct answer)
- Normal performance
- Phonemic paraphasia
- Pure word deafness
Correct answer: Possible semantic paraphasia or mild anomia
Substituting a different animal name suggests semantic paraphasia or word-retrieval difficulty, both indicators of possible language impairment.
Question 5: On the MoCA repetition task, sentences are read aloud and the patient must repeat them verbatim. How many sentences are presented?
- 2 (Correct answer)
- 3
- 4
- 1
Correct answer: 2
Two sentences of increasing grammatical complexity are read aloud, and the patient must repeat each one exactly for credit.
Question 6: Which MoCA repetition sentence tests more complex syntactic processing?
- 'The cat always hid under the couch when dogs were in the room.' (Correct answer)
- 'I only know that John is the one to help today.'
- 'The dog sat on the mat.'
- 'She went to the store yesterday.'
Correct answer: 'The cat always hid under the couch when dogs were in the room.'
The longer sentence with a subordinate clause ('when dogs were in the room') demands greater syntactic processing and working memory.
Question 7: If a patient omits one word from a MoCA repetition sentence, how is this scored?
- No point is awarded for that sentence (Correct answer)
- Half a point is awarded
- Full point if meaning is preserved
- The examiner may prompt once
Correct answer: No point is awarded for that sentence
The MoCA requires verbatim repetition; any omission, substitution, or addition results in no point for that sentence.
MoCA Language 2
On the MoCA, the fluency task asks the patient to name as many words as possible beginning with a specific letter in one minute.
Which letter is used?