Visual Memory in Unilateral Spatial Neglect: Immediate Recall versus Delayed Recognition

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (9) ◽  
pp. 2155-2170 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elior Moreh ◽  
Tal Seidel Malkinson ◽  
Ehud Zohary ◽  
Nachum Soroker

Patients with unilateral spatial neglect (USN) often show impaired performance in spatial working memory tasks, apart from the difficulty retrieving “left-sided” spatial data from long-term memory, shown in the “piazza effect” by Bisiach and colleagues. This study's aim was to compare the effect of the spatial position of a visual object on immediate and delayed memory performance in USN patients. Specifically, immediate verbal recall performance, tested using a simultaneous presentation of four visual objects in four quadrants, was compared with memory in a later-provided recognition task, in which objects were individually shown at the screen center. Unlike healthy controls, USN patients showed a left-side disadvantage and a vertical bias in the immediate free recall task (69% vs. 42% recall for right- and left-sided objects, respectively). In the recognition task, the patients correctly recognized half of “old” items, and their correct rejection rate was 95.5%. Importantly, when the analysis focused on previously recalled items (in the immediate task), no statistically significant difference was found in the delayed recognition of objects according to their original quadrant of presentation. Furthermore, USN patients were able to recollect the correct original location of the recognized objects in 60% of the cases, well beyond chance level. This suggests that the memory trace formed in these cases was not only semantic but also contained a visuospatial tag. Finally, successful recognition of objects missed in recall trials points to formation of memory traces for neglected contralesional objects, which may become accessible to retrieval processes in explicit memory.

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew S. Lee ◽  
Baaba K. Blankson ◽  
Peter Manza ◽  
Jonathan F. O’Rawe ◽  
Craig Evinger ◽  
...  

AbstractSpontaneous eye blink rate (SBR) has been associated with central dopamine (DA) levels, raising the intriguing possibility that SBR is related to cognitive functions dependent on DA, such as spatial working memory (WM). We tested this hypothesis in two behavioral experiments, examining the relationship between SBR, WM load and individual differences in spatial WM performance in 126 young adults. In Experiment 1, we examined the temporal profile of SBR during a spatial delayed recognition task requiring maintenance of 1, 2, 4, 6 or 7 dot locations. We observed a suppression in SBR during dot- and recognition probe-presentation, and a significant increase in SBR afterwards. High performers showed significantly lower SBR than low performers during the first 500 ms of the delay period. In Experiment 2, we used a similar spatial WM task as Experiment 1 to test whether an instructed voluntary blink during the early delay would directly dampen WM performance. While the temporal dynamics of SBR across task events were comparable to Experiment 1, WM performance was not significantly different between the voluntary blink and no blink conditions. Together, these results suggest that spontaneous but not voluntary eye blinking is closely linked to spatial WM, and that lower SBR during WM encoding and early phase of maintenance is associated with better WM task performance.


1993 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 143-150 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. D’Erme ◽  
I. Robertson ◽  
P. Bartolomeo ◽  
A. Daniele

Recent neuropsychological literature has provided evidence for the phenomenon of perception without awareness, also referred to as covert (or implicit) knowledge or tacit awareness. Yet little is known to date about the fate of extinguished stimuli in patients with unilateral spatial neglect. Six right brain-damaged patients with USN and one control subject were presented with single lateralized visual stimuli and with pairs of same or different visual stimuli (one right, one left). A same/different judgement and a multiple choice recognition task were performed on overtly unidentified left-sided stimuli, to unveil possible phenomena of covert knowledge. Some evidence of covert knowledge was observed, and its relation to stimulus characteristics and task demands is discussed.


2012 ◽  
Vol 25 (0) ◽  
pp. 180
Author(s):  
Antonia Thelen ◽  
Céline Cappe ◽  
Micah M. Murray

Multisensory experiences influence subsequent memory performance and brain responses. Studies have thus far concentrated on semantically congruent pairings, leaving unresolved the influence of stimulus pairing and memory sub-types. Here, we paired images with unique, meaningless sounds during a continuous recognition task to determine if purely episodic, single-trial multisensory experiences can incidentally impact subsequent visual object discrimination. Psychophysics and electrical neuroimaging analyses of visual evoked potentials (VEPs) compared responses to repeated images either paired or not with a meaningless sound during initial encounters. Recognition accuracy was significantly impaired for images initially presented as multisensory pairs and could not be explained in terms of differential attention or transfer of effects from encoding to retrieval. VEP modulations occurred at 100–130 and 270–310 ms and stemmed from topographic differences indicative of network configuration changes within the brain. Distributed source estimations localized the earlier effect to regions of the right posterior temporal gyrus (STG) and the later effect to regions of the middle temporal gyrus (MTG). Responses in these regions were stronger for images previously encountered as multisensory pairs. Only the later effect correlated with performance such that greater MTG activity in response to repeated visual stimuli was linked with greater performance decrements. The present findings suggest that brain networks involved in this discrimination may critically depend on whether multisensory events facilitate or impair later visual memory performance. More generally, the data support models whereby effects of multisensory interactions persist to incidentally affect subsequent behavior as well as visual processing during its initial stages.


GeroPsych ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 169-175 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adrian Schwaninger ◽  
Diana Hardmeier ◽  
Judith Riegelnig ◽  
Mike Martin

In recent years, research on cognitive aging increasingly has focused on the cognitive development across middle adulthood. However, little is still known about the long-term effects of intensive job-specific training of fluid intellectual abilities. In this study we examined the effects of age- and job-specific practice of cognitive abilities on detection performance in airport security x-ray screening. In Experiment 1 (N = 308; 24–65 years), we examined performance in the X-ray Object Recognition Test (ORT), a speeded visual object recognition task in which participants have to find dangerous items in x-ray images of passenger bags; and in Experiment 2 (N = 155; 20–61 years) in an on-the-job object recognition test frequently used in baggage screening. Results from both experiments show high performance in older adults and significant negative age correlations that cannot be overcome by more years of job-specific experience. We discuss the implications of our findings for theories of lifespan cognitive development and training concepts.


2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Veronelli ◽  
Giuseppe Vallar ◽  
Chiara V. Marinelli ◽  
Silvia Primativo ◽  
Lisa S. Arduino

Author(s):  
Jordan E. Pierce ◽  
Roberta Ronchi ◽  
Marine Thomasson ◽  
Irene Rossi ◽  
Carlotta Casati ◽  
...  

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