Biomedical subjects

A Herlitz

Publications and source records attributed to A Herlitz.

26 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

PubMed1991

Cue utilization following different forms of encoding in mildly, moderately, and severely demented patients with Alzheimer's disease.

The ability of patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) to utilize semantic category cues in order to improve memory performance was examined. Categorizable lists of words or objects were presented under five different encoding conditions: (a) nouns, (b) objects, (c) objects with a semantic orienting question, (d) objects with self-generated motoric acts, and (e) objects with experimenter-instructed motoric acts. Subjects were asked to memorize the items for a free recall test, and were subsequently provided with the category names in a cued recall test. Mildly, moderately, and severely demented AD patients, and a group of normal older adults participated in the study. Results showed that normal older adults and mildly demented AD subjects were able to utilize cues to improve memory performance in all conditions. Moderately demented patients utilized cues in all conditions except in the verbal condition (condition [a]), whereas severely demented patients utilized cues only in the motoric condition (condition [e]). These results suggest that the ability to utilize category cues following a motoric encoding is preserved later in AD than the ability to utilize cues after a semantic encoding.

Aged↗

PubMed1991

The generalizability of training gains in dementia: effects of an imagery-based mnemonic on face-name retention duration.

The generalizability of the results from a case study on the effects of an imagery mnemonic on face-name recall in dementia was examined (Hill, Evankovich, Sheikh, & Yesavage, 1987). Seven patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) and 1 patient with multi-infarct dementia (MID) were trained by using the method devised by Hill et al. Application of the mnemonic increased the time during which face-name associations could be held in memory for 1 AD patient, and this improvement was maintained in a 1-month follow-up assessment. However, no training gains were observed for the remaining 7 patients, thus questioning the generalizability of this method in enhancing memory in dementia.

Aged↗

PubMed1991

Semantic organization and verbal episodic memory in patients with mild and moderate Alzheimer's disease.

The objective of the present research was to investigate the relationship between semantic organization and cue utilization in mildly and moderately demented patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). In Experiment 1, subjects were presented with two lists of words: a list with semantically unrelated words and a list with words from four semantic categories presented randomly intermixed. Free recall was assessed and following the organizable list, subjects received a cued recall test. Normal controls, as opposed to mildly and moderately demented patients, showed higher performance in the organizable list as compared to the random list. In addition, normal controls and mildly demented patients benefited from semantic cues in the organizable list and performed at a higher level in total recall as compared to free recall. In Experiment 2, subjects were presented with two lists of words: a list with words from four semantic categories presented randomly intermixed and a list with words from four semantic categories presented clustered, together with information about the organization of the list. Free recall and cued recall, with the category names serving as cues, were assessed. Free recall performance of normal controls was higher in the clustered than in the organizable list, whereas no such effect was observed for the AD patients. Normal controls and mildly demented patients performed at a higher level in total as compared to free recall in both lists, whereas this effect was present only in the clustered list for the moderately demented patients. The overall pattern of results indicates that there are conditions under which memory facilitation from semantic organization may be obtained in AD.

Aged↗

PubMed1990

The relationship between prior knowledge and face recognition memory in normal aging and Alzheimer's disease.

Normal older adults (M = 66.1 years) and mildly demented patients with a presumptive diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease (M = 68.0 years) studied a series of dated and contemporary famous faces for purposes of later recognition. In conjunction with the recognition test, subjects were asked to indicate whether they perceived the faces as familiar on the basis of pre-experimental knowledge, and to select the correct name for each face in a four-alternative multiple-choice test. Results showed that both groups of subjects (a) perceived more dated than contemporary faces as familiar, and (b) performed better for dated than for contemporary faces in the name recognition task. This pattern of results indicates an advantage of dated over contemporary information as general knowledge for both groups of subjects. In the episodic face recognition task, normal older adults performed better for dated than for contemporary faces, whereas demented patients performed equally well for both types of faces. The overall pattern of outcome suggests that Alzheimer's disease is associated with a deficit in the ability to utilize task-relevant prior knowledge to enhance episodic remembering.

Aged↗

PubMed1989

Memory improvement at different stages of Alzheimer's disease.

Three groups of patients with dementia of the Alzheimer type (mildly, moderately and severely demented) and two groups of healthy older adults (73 and 82 yr old) were examined on free and cued recall of subject-performed tasks (SPTs) or verbally presented sentences depicting the same verbal information as the SPTs. Results indicated that all groups examined performed better on SPTs than on the verbal task. In addition, for all groups cuing effects were greater in the SPT task than in the verbal task.

Aged↗

PubMed1987

Patterns of memory performance in young-old and old-old adults: a selective review.

Three experiments were discussed as a means of bridging the gap between biological and psychological data on aging and memory. Memory performances of young-old (73 year-old) and old-old (82 year-old) subjects were compared. The common denominator of these experiments was that contextual or cognitive support had been provided at study and/or test. The rationale behind discussing these experiments in the present context was that subjects should be able to use this support to focus attention on the critical aspects of the to-be-remembered information; thereby the subjects should be able to compensate for neurological degeneration pertinent to attentional difficulties. The nature of the differences between young-old and old-old subjects was found to vary among tasks. Study 1 demonstrated qualitative differences between young-old and old-old subjects, whereas Studies 2 and 3 demonstrated the differences to be merely quantitative in nature. Implications for memory training programs for the elderly were discussed.

Adult↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Recall of object names and colors of objects in normal aging and Alzheimer's disease.

The Subject Performed Task (SPT) was used in order to determine whether normal older adults and patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) differ in the ability to remember verbal and physical information. Mildly and moderately demented patients and normal controls were instructed to perform a series of SPTs involving objects, and were examined on recall of the object names and the colors of the objects. It was assumed that encoding and retrieval of the object names require a more extensive semantic elaboration than encoding and retrieval of the colors of the objects. Results showed that normal older adults performed at a higher level than the groups of mildly and moderately demented patients, and that the colors of the objects were better remembered than the object names for all groups. However, the magnitude of impairment in the AD groups was equal for both types of information. These results are in agreement with the notion that the episodic memory impairment in AD is global, rather than mediated by deficits in semantic memory.

Journal Article↗

PubMedDate not supplied

Pre-experimental knowledge facilitates episodic recall in young, young-old, and old-old adults.

Younger adults (mean age = 19.6), 73-year-olds and 82-year-olds were examined on free recall of verbal materials varying in datedness (i.e., names of people who attained their fame during the 1930s or the 1980s). The main result was an interaction between age and type of materials. Whereas younger adults performed better for "new" than for "old" items, both elderly groups recalled more old than new items. A highlight of these data is that activation of pre-experimental knowledge structures appears to improve episodic recall in both young-old and old-old adults.

Adolescent↗