PRESERVED FAMILIARITY-BASED RECOGNITION MEMORY IN A CASE OF GLOBAL PRESERVED FAMILIARITY-BASED RECOGNITION MEMORY IN A CASE OF GLOBAL AMNESIAAMNESIAChristine BASTIN1, Martial VAN DER LINDEN1,2, Annik CHARNALLET3, & Stéphane ADAM1

1 Neuropsychology Unit, University of Liège, Liège, Belgium, 2 Cognitive Psychopathology Unit, University of Geneva, Switzerland, 3 Neurology Unit, CHU, Grenoble, France

Introduction

Some studies have described amnesic patients with lesions limited to the « extended hippocampal system » (1) that presented preserved recognition together with severely impaired recall (1,2,3).

It has been suggested that, in these patients, familiarity-based recognition may be intact, while recollection is affected (1).

The present study explores the recognition memory performance of a severely amnesic patient (ER) showing preserved item recognition and impaired recall.

Methods

Patient ER

Tasks

Non verbal subtests from the Doors and People Test Battery (Baddeley et al., 1994)** Baddeley, A. D., Emslie, H., & Nimmo-Smith, I. (1994). Doors and People : A test of visual and verbal recall and recognition. Bury St. Edmunds, England: Thames Valley Test Co.

-Shapes subtests: recall of 4 drawings

-Doors test: 4-alternative forced-choice recognition of pictures of 12 doors (set A: foils relatively different from the targets; set B: foils very similar to the targets)

-Tasks matched on difficulty

Results

Yes-no and forced-choice recognition memory Yes-no task: 18 faces, presented for 1.5 sec.; test = 18 old + 18 new, yes-no recognition

Forced-choice task: 18 faces, presented for 1.5 sec.; test = 18 old-new pairs, forced-choice recognition

References(1) Aggleton, J. P. & Shaw (1996) Amnesia and recognition memory: A reanalysis of psychometric data. Neuropsychologia,34, 51-62.

(2) Mayes, A. R., Isaac, C. L., Holdstock, J. S., Hunkin, N. M., Montaldi, D., Downes, J. J., MacDonald, C., Cezayirli, E., & Roberts, J. N. (2001). Memoy for single items, word pairs, and temporal order of different kinds in a patient with selective hippocampal lesions. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 18, 97-123.

(3) Vargha-Khadem, F., Gadian, D. G., Watkins, K. E., Connelly, A., Van Paesschen, W., & Mishkin, M. (1997). Differential effects of early hippocampal pathology on episodic and semantic memory. Science, 277, 376-380.

(4) Bastin, C., & Van der Linden, M. (submitted). The contribution of recollection and familiarity to recognition memory: A study of the effects of test format and aging.

This work was supported by a grant from the French Community of Belgium : Actions de Recherche Concertées - convention 99/04-246.

Conclusions

ER’s results provide some additional evidence that item recognition memory can be relatively preserved in amnesia.

Recollection seems more affected than familiarity. A preserved familiarity may support ER’s item recognition.

- 65 year-old right-handed man

- used to be a chief architect

- 1983: Carbon monoxid poisoning

- Memory disorders since then

- MR scan: bilateral lesions to the pallidum; hippocampal lesions suspected, but to-be-confirmed

WAIS-R QI V : 116

QI P : 123

QI T : 122

WMS-R Verbal memory index : 74

Visual memory index : 101

General memory index : 83Digit span 5

ER’s performance were compared with that of 18 men matched on age and education

• ER’s impairment in Shapes recall was more severe than his impairment in Doors recognition

• ER’s recognition performance was normal when the foils were relatively different from the targets

A previous study using these tasks showed that the participants based their recognition decisions more frequently on familiarity in the forced-choice task than in the yes-no task (4).

• ER showed a normal recognition memory, despite his severe amnesia

• ER’s performance was slightly better in the forced-choice task than in the yes-no task (false alarms)

• Familiarity-based recognition may be preserved?

Process Dissociation Procedure (task adapted from Jennings & Jacoby, 1997)°° Jennings, J. M. & Jacoby, L. L. (1997). An opposition procedure for detecting age-related deficits in recollection : Telling effects of repetition. Psychology and Aging, 12, 352-361.

Two tasks : one task with words as material, the other with unfamiliar faces as material

In each : Study phase: 40 items, presented for 3 sec.

Test phase: yes-no recognition; 40 targets + 40 distractors presented twice (after 0, 3 or 12 items)

- Inclusion : say « yes » to items that have been seen at least once (targets + second presentation of the distractors)

- Exclusion : say « yes » only to studied items

Results Words Faces

ER’s performance were compared with that of 4 men matched on age and education

ER’s performance were compared with that of 2 men matched on age and education

• Intact automatic process (familiarity); slight decrease of controlled process (recollection), that needs to be confirmed with more control data.-9-8-7-6-5-4-3-2-10

set A set B total score (3trials)

Doors recognition (number of correct responses) Shapes Recall(number of details

recalled)

Dis

tan

ce

to

th

e c

on

tro

l me

an

(in

s

tan

da

rd d

ev

iati

on

s u

nit

s)

Results

-2

-1,5

-1

-0,5

0

0,5

1

1,5

hits falsealarms

d' prop.correct

d'

yes-no task forced-choice task

Dis

tan

ce

to

th

e c

on

tro

l me

an

(in

s

tan

da

rd d

ev

iati

on

s u

nit

s)

0

0,1

0,2

0,3

0,4

0,5

0,6

0,7

0,8

0,9

1

int. 3 int. 12 total(3+12)

int. 3 int. 12 total(3+12)

Automatic Controlled

Pro

ce

ss

es

es

tim

ate

s

E.R.

Control mean(+/- 2 SD)

0

0,1

0,2

0,3

0,4

0,5

0,6

0,7

0,8

0,9

1

int. 3 int. 12 total(3+12)

int. 3 int. 12 total(3+12)

Automatic Controlled

Pro

ce

ss

es

es

tim

ate

s

E.R.

Control mean(+/- 2 SD)