1/4. The assessment of cognitive procedural learning in amnesia: why the tower of Hanoi has fallen down.The Tower of Hanoi has been widely accepted as an evaluation of cognitive procedural learning in amnesia but inconsistent findings have raised questions about the nature of the learning process involved in this task. This article presents the performance of a hippocampal amnesic, MS, who, showing poor learning across daily sessions of a formal evaluation, subsequently solved the puzzle through spontaneous use of a declarative-level strategy (the odd-even rule), suggesting that his primary approach to the task was the deployment of declarative solution-searching strategies. The presented data suggest normal learning within daily sessions, but subnormal learning across daily sessions due to the forgetting of acquired declarative information. It is suggested that tasks that are potentially solvable by an algorithm or rule, as is the Tower of Hanoi, be regarded as inappropriate for use in cognitive procedural assessments.- - - - - - - - - - ranking = 1keywords = nature (Clic here for more details about this article) |
2/4. An atypical neuropsychological profile of a korsakoff syndrome patient throughout the follow-up.The basis of amnesia in alcoholic Wernicke-korsakoff syndrome (WKS) has been generally associated with diencephalic lesions and more specifically with lesions of the anterior thalamic nuclei. These brain structures are considered to be involved in encoding/consolidation processes of episodic memory. However, frontal lobe damage responsible for executive function deficits has also been documented. The present report details the nature and extent of amnesia in an alcoholic patients with WKS and which appears to be mainly due to frontal lobe (executive) deficits.- - - - - - - - - - ranking = 1keywords = nature (Clic here for more details about this article) |
3/4. Characteristics of the memory loss of a patient with Wernicke-Korsakoff's syndrome without alcoholism.The memory loss in alcoholic Wernicke-korsakoff syndrome has been well characterized. However, it has been suggested that some of the neuropsychological defects seen in these patients are due to frontal lobe dysfunction resulting from chronic alcohol abuse. The present report details the nature and extent of the amnesia in a Wernicke-Korsakoff patient who did not have a history of alcoholism. In spite of her normal performance on measures of frontal lobe function, this patient showed many characteristics similar to those seen in alcoholic Wernicke-korsakoff syndrome including a graded loss of remote memories and abnormal semantic information processing. Thus, the extent of the "core" features of this amnesic syndrome may be greater than was previously thought.- - - - - - - - - - ranking = 1keywords = nature (Clic here for more details about this article) |
4/4. Neuropsychological sequelae of Wernicke's encephalopathy in a 20-year-old woman: selective impairment of a frontal memory system.This article reports the neuropsychological sequelae of Wernicke's Encephalopathy in a 20-year-old woman. After amelioration of acute symptoms, the patient showed a range of cognitive impairments the most marked of which was a severe impairment on free recall tasks involving both verbal and nonverbal material. In contrast, recognition memory appeared remarkably well preserved. Some evidence of frontal lobe and general intellectual impairment was also noted. The case is discussed in terms of the pathophysiology of Wernicke-korsakoff syndrome, criteria for its diagnosis, and the multicomponent nature of memory deficits.- - - - - - - - - - ranking = 1keywords = nature (Clic here for more details about this article) |