L10 - Neuropsychology of Memory Flashcards
what is amnesia
- Intelligence is intact
- Attentional span is intact
- Personality is unaffected
- Ability to take in new information is severely and usually permanently affected
describe what stays intact in amnesia
Verbal and visual short-term memory is intact
- Phonological store and visuospatial sketchpad unaffected
- Double dissociation with patients with impaired STM
Digit span
—Repeat the numbers “2…7…4…9…2…8”
Spatial span
—Tap the same blocks as me, in the same order
what type of brain damage occurs in amnesia
- Amnesia is usually caused by damage to the medial temporal lobe or anatomically connected regions
- Can occur in head injuries, Alzheimer’s disease, epilepsy, stroke
what does anterograde amnesia mean
- Anterograde means after brain injury
- Anterograde episodic memories are severely affected
- HM was severely impaired no matter what kind of memory test was given (Corkin, 2002)
–words, faces, tones, public events, etc
–Regardless of the sensory modality through which info was presented
–Regardless of test format (free recall, cued recall, recognition)
look at slide 9
how was it
describe how procedural memory is affected by amnesia
- Procedural memory
- Amnesics can learn new skills
–Mirror tracing (Corkin, 1968)
–Mirror reading (Cohen & Squire, 1980)
what is the evidence for independent procedural memory system
- Butters et al., (1990)
- Task was a pursuit-rotor task
- Healthy controls and patients with Alzheimer’s disease (DAT) showed normal learning (implicit memory)
- Patients with Huntingdon’s disease (HD) were impaired
describe the dedicated brain systems for procedural memory
-Basal ganglia
Impaired in
-Huntingdon’s disease
describe priming
degraded picture identification
5 amnesic patients
describe anterograde amnesia
Episodic memory:
- Memory for events and occurrences that are specific in time and place
- “What” “Where” “When”
Semantic memory:
- Knowledge of facts, concepts, word meanings, etc.
- Can be retrieved without knowledge about where and when the information was acquired
Describe anterograde amnesia
All declarative memories (episodic and semantic) depend on medial temporal lobes for their acquisition and short-term retention
episodic & semantic memory is poor -(Supports Squire’s Declarative Memory Theory
)
Declarative memory theory
can new semantic memory be formed despite amnesia
- NO
-Evidence- Bayley et al., (2008) tested new vocabulary in 2 adult amnesics
Each test item contained one target word (e.g., Prozac) and eight foil words (e.g., Flozac, Prozam, Grodaz, etc).
Anterograde amnesia- according to Beth, Jon and Kate are typical amnesics (Vargha-Khadem et al., 1997)
can new semantic memories
- Yes
- They sustained damage to the hippocampus just after birth
- Have grossly impaired episodic memory
- BUT, they completed normal schooling, have good vocabularies and knowledge about the world
can new semantic memories be formed despite amnesia -give examples
Yes: Examples
Q: Which country in the world has the largest population? Beth: China. Q: Who was Martin Luther King? Jon: An American; fought for black rights; black rights leader in the 1970s; got assassinated
Q: What is the capital of Italy? Kate: Rome
Q: What does “boast” mean? Beth: If someone has done something, they boast about it; they show off. Q: What is a “sanctuary”? Jon: Safe haven; place of safety everyone can go to. Q: What does “obstruct” mean? Kate: To get in the way of something
describe anterograde amnesia Sharon et al., (2011) tested new learning in adult amnesics
When learning was “incidental” amnesics could learn the names of objects
Complete failure when explicitly asked to remember
therefore yes semantic memory is intact -which doesn’t support Squire’s Declarative Memory Theory
