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Aging is associated with cognitive decline, specifically in episodic memory. However, there are large individual differences in the extent of this decline and previous research suggests that these are associated with differences in executive functioning (EF). These EF differences, and associated differences in the encoding and retrieval of episodic information, have been linked to differences in the activation of particular brain regions. The "encoding/retrieval flip" (E/R flip) framework assumes deactivation and activation of specific brain regions during successful encoding and retrieval, respectively. The present study assessed whether this framework can be used to explain EF-based individual differences in memory performance of young and older participants. Young adults (N = 19) and older adults (N = 39) performed an incidental semantic encoding and memory recognition task in an fMRI setting, focusing on brain regions that show the E/R flip. The association between an index of EF and fMRI activity in brain regions showing the E/R flip was tested in each age group. EF predicted E/R flip activity in the older, but not young adults. These findings underscore the importance of individual differences in ageing research and provide empirical evidence for the association between EF and the E/R flip., (Copyright © 2020 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Background: It is uncertain whether self- and proxy-reported cognitive decline in older adults reflect an actual objective cognitive dysfunction in the clinical sense, and if these are predictive for developing dementia., Objective: The aim of the present study is to investigate the cross-sectional and longitudinal relation between subjective cognitive decline and objective cognitive performance, depressive symptoms, and to determine the predictive value for development of dementia., Methods: We included 405 patients without dementia at first visit from the Maastricht memory clinic participating in a longitudinal cohort study. Subjective cognitive decline was measured using a self- and proxy-report questionnaire. All patients underwent a standardized neuropsychological assessment. Follow-up assessments were performed yearly for three consecutive years, and once after five years., Results: Subjective cognitive decline was associated with lower cognitive performance and more depressive symptoms. When comparing self- (n = 342, 84%) and proxy-reported decline (n = 110, 27%), it was shown that proxy reports were associated with a more widespread pattern of lower cognitive performance. In participants without cognitive impairment proxy-reported decline was not associated with depressive symptoms. In contrast, self-reported decline was associated with a stable course of depressive symptoms at follow-up. Proxy-reported cognitive decline (HR = 1.76, 95% CI = 1.12- 2.78), and mutual complaints (HR = 1.73, CI:1.09- 2.76) predicted incident dementia while self-reported decline did not reach statistical significance (HR = 1.26, 95% CI = 0.65- 2.43)., Conclusion: Proxy-reported cognitive decline was consistently associated with lower cognitive performance and conversion to dementia over 5 years. Self-reported cognitive decline in patients without cognitive impairment might indicate underlying depressive symptoms and thus deserve clinical attention as well.

Background: Whether older adults use effective memory strategies to compensate for their memory decline partly depends on their executive functioning (EF). However, many studies have overlooked the role of cognitive reserve (CR). This study examines the effects of age, EF, and CR on memory strategy use., Methods: A total of 83 participants (aged 18-85 years) were included. Strategy use was assessed using three measures: (1) self-reported strategy use in daily life, (2) self-reported and observed strategy use in a simulated daily life situation, and (3) self-reported strategy use during a word-pair task., Results: Results showed that CR was the strongest predictor of strategy use, both in daily life and during memory tasks. Although effects of age and EF were found, most of these effects disappeared when CR was added to the model. Furthermore, a higher CR was related to the use of more complex strategies and to more effective strategies in relation to task performance., Conclusions: Higher levels of CR seem to enable individuals to use effective strategies. These results highlight the importance of the role of CR in compensating for the aging-related memory decline.

Objective: To examine the cognitive profile of patients with myotonic dystrophy type 1 (DM1) on the basis of a systematic review and meta-analysis of the literature., Methods: Embase, Medline and PsycInfo were searched for studies reporting ≥1 neuropsychological test in both DM1 patients and healthy controls. Search, data extraction and risk of bias analysis were independently performed by two authors to minimize error. Neuropsychological tests were categorized into 12 cognitive domains and effect sizes (Hedges' g) were calculated for each domain and for tests administered in ≥5 studies., Results: DM1 participants demonstrated a significantly worse performance compared to controls in all cognitive domains. Effect sizes ranged from -.33 (small) for verbal memory to -1.01 (large) for visuospatial perception. Except for the domains global cognition, intelligence and social cognition, wide confidence intervals (CIs) were associated with moderate to marked statistical heterogeneity that necessitates careful interpretation of results. Out of the individual tests, the Rey-Osterrieth complex figure-copy (both non-verbal memory and visuoconstruction) showed consistent impairment with acceptable heterogeneity., Conclusion: In DM1 patients, cognitive deficits may include a variable combination of global cognitive impairment with involvement across different domains, including social cognition, memory and visuospatial functioning. Although DM1 is a heterogeneous disorder, our study shows that meta-analysis is feasible, contributes to the understanding of brain involvement and may direct bedside testing. The protocol for this study has been registered in PROSPERO (International prospective register of systematic reviews) under ID: 42016037415., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Background: Subjective memory complaints (SMC) are common among older adults, but it is unclear to what extent adults with SMC spontaneously use memory strategies to compensate for their memory problems. As SMC may be a risk factor for memory decline later, it is important to extend our knowledge about spontaneous compensatory mechanisms in older adults with SMC., Method: Self-reported strategy use and observed strategy use were assessed in 38 adults with and 38 without SMC., Results: Adults with SMC used more strategies in daily life than those without. In the SMC group, memory complaints were positively correlated with strategy use. Only in adults without SMC, a significant correlation was found between observed strategy use and task performance., Conclusion: Strategy use in older adults with SMC may be compensatory in nature, but did not increase their objective memory performance. Therefore, older adults with SMC might benefit from interventions aimed at optimizing strategy use.

Syntactic priming, the phenomenon in which participants adopt the linguistic behaviour of their partner, is widely used in psycholinguistics to investigate syntactic operations. Although the phenomenon of syntactic priming is well documented, the memory system that supports the retention of this syntactic information long enough to influence future utterances, is not as widely investigated. We aim to shed light on this issue by assessing patients with Korsakoff's amnesia on an active-passive syntactic priming task and compare their performance to controls matched in age, education, and premorbid intelligence. Patients with Korsakoff's syndrome display deficits in all subdomains of declarative memory, yet their nondeclarative memory remains intact, making them an ideal patient group to determine which memory system supports syntactic priming. In line with the hypothesis that syntactic priming relies on nondeclarative memory, the patient group shows strong priming tendencies (12.6% passive structure repetition). Our healthy control group did not show a priming tendency, presumably due to cognitive interference between declarative and nondeclarative memory. We discuss the results in relation to amnesia, aging, and compensatory mechanisms., (Copyright © 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.)

Introduction: Intrusions on verbal memory tests have been used as an index for clinical confabulation. Severe memory impairments in combination with executive dysfunction have been suggested to be the underlying mechanism of confabulation, but to date, this relation is unclear. The aim of this study was (a) to examine the relation between (different types of) intrusions and confabulations in a large sample of confabulating patients with Korsakoff's syndrome (KS) and (b) to investigate whether different measures of executive functioning and memory performance are related to provoked and spontaneous confabulation., Method: The Dutch version of the California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT) and various executive function and memory tests were administered to a group of 51 confabulating patients with KS. Professional caregivers rated the severity of provoked and spontaneous confabulation behavior of the patients using the Nijmegen-Venray Confabulation List-20 (NVCL-20)., Results: The total number of intrusions on the CVLT was not related to either provoked or spontaneous confabulation scores. None of the CVLT intrusion scores correlated significantly with any of the confabulation scores, but we did find small-to-medium, positive correlations between unrelated intrusions and both provoked confabulations and spontaneous confabulation. Provoked confabulation behavior was associated with executive dysfunction and poorer memory performances. Spontaneous confabulation was not related to performance on measures of executive function and memory., Conclusions: The total number of intrusions on verbal memory tests and clinical confabulations appear to be different phenomena. Only unrelated intrusions produced on the CVLT might possibly be related to confabulations. The production of provoked, but not spontaneous, confabulation is associated with executive dysfunction and memory deficits.

Whether older adults can compensate for their associative memory deficit by using memory strategies efficiently might depend on their general cognitive abilities. This study examined the moderating role of an IQ estimate on the beneficial effects of strategy instructions. A total of 142 participants (aged 18-85 years) received either intentional learning or strategy ("sentence generation") instructions during encoding of word pairs. Whereas young adults with a lower IQ benefited from strategy instructions, those with a higher IQ did not, presumably because they already use strategies spontaneously. Older adults showed the opposite effect: following strategy instructions, older adults with a higher IQ showed a strong increase in memory performance (approximately achieving the level of younger adults), whereas older adults with a lower IQ did not, suggesting that they have difficulties implementing the provided strategies. These results highlight the importance of the role of IQ in compensating for the aging-related memory decline.

Background: Context memory, or the ability to remember the context in which an episodic event has occurred (e.g., where and when an event took place), has been found to be compromised in Korsakoff's syndrome. This study examined whether a similar deficit would be observed for destination memory, that is, the ability to remember to whom an information was previously transmitted., Methods: Patients with Korsakoff's syndrome and healthy controls were instructed to tell proverbs to pictures of celebrities. In a subsequent recognition test, they had to indicate to which celebrity they had previously told the proverbs. Participants also completed a neuropsychological battery including a binding task in which they were required to associate letters with their correspondent locations to assess context memory., Results: Results showed worse binding and destination memory in patients with Korsakoff's syndrome than in controls. In the Korsakoff group, destination memory was significantly correlated with and predicted by performances on the binding task., Conclusions: The binding process seems to be impaired in Korsakoff's syndrome, a deficit that may account for the destination memory compromise in the syndrome, and probably, for the difficulty to retrieve the "where and when" of an encountered event., (Copyright © 2016 by the Research Society on Alcoholism.)

Objective: Even though the first awareness of confabulations is often based on observations, only questionnaires and structured interviews quantifying provoked confabulations are available. So far, no tools have been developed to measure spontaneous confabulation. This study describes and validates an observation scale for quantifying confabulation behavior, including spontaneous confabulations, in clinical practice., Method: An observation scale consisting of 20 items was developed, the Nijmegen-Venray Confabulation List-20 (NVCL-20). This scale covers spontaneous confabulation, provoked confabulation, and memory and orientation. Professional caregivers completed the NVCL-20 for 28 Korsakoff (KS) patients and 24 cognitively impaired chronic alcoholics (ALC). Their ratings were related to the Dalla Barba Confabulation Battery (DBCB), Provoked Confabulation Test (PCT), and standard neuropsychological tests., Results: The categories of the NVCL-20 have "good" to "excellent" internal consistency and inter-rater agreement. The KS patients confabulated more (both spontaneously and provoked), and more memory and orientation problems were observed. Correlations with neuropsychological test scores showed that confabulations were associated with memory deficits, but not with intrusions or tests of executive dysfunction., Conclusions: The NVCL-20 is the first instrument that includes items addressing spontaneous confabulation. Administration is reliable, valid and feasible in clinical practice, making it a useful addition to existing confabulating measures.

Background: patients suspected of dementia frequently undergo additional diagnostic testing (e.g. brain imaging or neuropsychological assessment) after standard clinical assessment at a memory clinic. This study investigates the use of additional testing in an academic outpatient memory clinic and how it influences the initial diagnosis., Methods: the initial diagnosis after standard clinical assessment (history, laboratory tests, cognitive screening and physical and neurological examination) and the final diagnosis after additional testing of 752 memory clinic patients were collected. We specifically registered if, and what type of, additional testing was requested., Results: additional testing was performed in 518 patients (69%), 67% of whom underwent magnetic resonance imaging, 45% had neuropsychological assessment, 14% had cerebrospinal fluid analysis and 49% had (combinations of) other tests. This led to a modification of the initial diagnosis in 17% of the patients. The frequency of change was highest in patients with an initial non-Alzheimer's disease (AD) dementia diagnosis (54%, compared with 11 and 14% in patients with AD and 'no dementia'; P < 0.01). Finally, after additional testing 44% was diagnosed with AD, 9% with non-AD dementia and 47% with 'no dementia'., Conclusion: additional testing should especially be considered in non-AD patients. In the large group of patients with an initial AD or 'no dementia' diagnosis, additional tests have little diagnostic impact and may perhaps be used with more restraint., (© The Author 2014. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the British Geriatrics Society. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oup.com.)

Objective: We investigated the effects of 2-year folic acid and vitamin B12 supplementation on cognitive performance in elderly people with elevated homocysteine (Hcy) levels., Methods: This multicenter, double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial included 2,919 elderly participants (65 years and older) with Hcy levels between 12 and 50 µmol/L. Participants received daily either a tablet with 400 µg folic acid and 500 µg vitamin B12 (B-vitamin group) or a placebo tablet. Both tablets contained 15 µg vitamin D3. Data were available for global cognitive functioning assessed by Mini-Mental State Examination (n = 2,556), episodic memory (n = 2,467), attention and working memory (n = 759), information processing speed (n = 731), and executive function (n = 721)., Results: Mean age was 74.1 (SD 6.5) years. Hcy concentrations decreased 5.0 (95% confidence interval -5.3 to -4.7) µmol/L in the B-vitamin group and 1.3 (-1.6 to -0.9) µmol/L in the placebo group. Cognitive domain scores did not differ over time between the 2 groups, as determined by analysis of covariance. Mini-Mental State Examination score decreased with 0.1 (-0.2 to 0.0) in the B-vitamin group and 0.3 (-0.4 to -0.2) in the placebo group (p = 0.05), as determined by an independent t test., Conclusions: Two-year folic acid and vitamin B12 supplementation did not beneficially affect performance on 4 cognitive domains in elderly people with elevated Hcy levels. It may slightly slow the rate of decline of global cognition, but the reported small difference may be attributable to chance., Classification of Evidence: This study provides Class I evidence that 2-year supplementation with folic acid and vitamin B12 in hyperhomocysteinemic elderly people does not affect cognitive performance., (© 2014 American Academy of Neurology.)

Memory for contextual information and target-context integration are crucial for successful episodic memory formation and are impaired in patients with Korsakoff's syndrome. In this paper we review the evidence for the notion that a context memory deficit makes an important contribution to the amnesia in these patients. First, we focus on anterograde memory for contextual (spatial and temporal) information. Next, the use of contextual cues in memory retrieval is examined and their role in retrograde amnesia and confabulation. Evidence on the role of contextual cues and associations in working memory is discussed in relation to the underlying neurocognitive mechanisms and their dissociation from long-term encoding. Finally, we focus on implicit learning of contextual information in Korsakoff patients. It can be concluded that Korsakoff patients are impaired in the explicit processing of contextual information and in target-context binding, both in long-term (retrograde and anterograde) memory and in working memory. These results extend the context memory deficit hypothesis. In contrast, implicit contextual learning is relatively preserved in these patients. These findings are discussed in relation to evidence of dysfunction of the extended diencephalic-hippocampal memory circuit in Korsakoff's syndrome.

Objectives: Previous studies have revealed that memory performance is diminished in chronic pain patients. Few studies, however, have assessed multiple components of memory in a single sample. It is currently also unknown whether attentional problems, which are commonly observed in chronic pain, mediate the decline in memory. Finally, previous studies have focused on middle-aged adults, and a possible detrimental effect of aging on memory performance in chronic pain patients has been commonly disregarded. This study, therefore, aimed at describing the pattern of semantic, working, and visual and verbal episodic memory performance in participants with chronic pain, while testing for possible contributions of attention and age to task performance., Methods: Thirty-four participants with chronic pain and 32 pain-free participants completed tests of episodic, semantic, and working memory to assess memory performance and a test of attention., Results: Participants with chronic pain performed worse on tests of working memory and verbal episodic memory. A decline in attention explained some, but not all, group differences in memory performance. Finally, no additional effect of age on the diminished task performance in participants with chronic pain was observed., Discussion: Taken together, the results indicate that chronic pain significantly affects memory performance. Part of this effect may be caused by underlying attentional dysfunction, although this could not fully explain the observed memory decline. An increase in age in combination with the presence of chronic pain did not additionally affect memory performance.

The present study was intended to compare age effects on visual and spatial working memory by using two versions of the same task that differed only in presentation mode. The working memory task contained both a simultaneous and a sequential presentation mode condition, reflecting, respectively, visual and spatial working memory processes. Young and older participants had to remember the locations of five equal objects under three different conditions: a baseline (immediate recall), a maintenance (including a delay of 5 seconds), and a manipulation (e.g., relocate all objects one column to the right) condition. Only older adults performed worse on the sequential compared to the simultaneous baseline condition and only this group revealed lower performance on the sequential delay compared to the simultaneous delay condition. However, in both groups the manipulation condition affected performance on the simultaneous and sequential presentation modes to the same extent. The findings of this study therefore partially support an age-related differentiation between visual and spatial working memory, with a stronger age effect on spatial than on visual working memory.

Object-location memory is an important form of spatial memory, comprising different subcomponents that each process specific types of information within memory, i.e. remembering objects, remembering positions and binding these features in memory. In the current study we investigated the neural correlates of binding categorical (relative) or coordinate (exact) position information with objects in memory. Therefore, an object-location memory battery was used, including different task conditions assessing object-location memory, i.e. memory for position information per se, and binding object information with coordinate and categorical position information. Sixty-one stroke patients with focal brain lesions were examined and compared with 77 healthy matched controls. The lesion subtraction method was used to define the area of overlap. Results indicate an important role of the left posterior parietal cortex in the binding of both categorical and coordinate positions with object information. Additionally, the hippocampus seems important for categorical object-location memory. This suggests that categorical and coordinate object-location memory depend on similar cognitive and neural systems.

It has been established that the medial temporal lobe, including the hippocampus, is crucial for associative memory. The aim of the current functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) study was to investigate whether the hippocampus is differentially activated for associations between items processed in the same neocortical region (within-domain) as compared with associations between items processed in different neocortical regions (between-domain). Here, we show that the hippocampus is significantly more active for between-domain associations compared with within-domain associations. Thus, the hippocampus is important for associative encoding, and furthermore, shows greater activation when the stimuli to be associated come from different stimulus categories.

Remembering where things are - object-location memory - is essential for daily-life functioning. Functionally, it can be decomposed into at least three distinct processing mechanisms: (a) object processing, (b) spatial-location processing and (c) object to location binding. A neurocognitive model is sketched, which posits a mostly bilateral ventral cortical network supporting object-identity memory, a left fronto-parietal circuit for categorical position processing and working memory aspects, and a right fronto-parietal circuit for coordinate position processing and working memory. Medial temporal lobes and in particular the hippocampus appear essential for object-location binding. It is speculated that categorical object-location binding and episodic memory binding in general depend more on the left-sided areas, whereas coordinate object-location processing and navigation in large scale space involve the right-sided counterparts. The various object-location memory components differ in the extent to which they are automatized or require central effort. While automatic routines protect against brain damage, neural deficits might potentially also lead to a shift upon the automatic-effortful continuum.

Spatial memory is crucial to our daily lives and in part strongly depends on automatic, implicit memory processes. This study investigates the neurocognitive basis of conscious and unconscious influences of object-location memory in amnesic patients with Korsakoff's syndrome (N = 23) and healthy controls (N = 18) using a process-dissociation procedure in a computerized spatial memory task. As expected, the patients performed substantially worse on the conscious memory measures but showed even slightly stronger effects of unconscious influences than the controls. Moreover, a delayed test administered after 1 week revealed a strong decline in conscious influences in the patients, while unconscious influences were not affected. The presented results suggest that conscious and unconscious influences of spatial memory can be clearly dissociated in Korsakoff's syndrome.

Previous work has shown that patients with depersonalization disorder (DPD) have reduced physiological responses to emotional stimuli, which may be related to subjective emotional numbing. This study investigated two aspects of affective processing in 13 patients with DPD according to the DSM-IV criteria and healthy controls: the perception of emotional facial expressions (anger, disgust, fear, happiness, sadness, and surprise) and memory for emotional stimuli. Results revealed a specific lack of sensitivity to facial expression of anger in patients, but normal enhancement of memory for peripheral aspects of arousing emotional material. The results are consistent with altered processing of threat-related stimuli but intact consolidation processes, at least when the stimuli involved are potently arousing.

There is evidence that age-related memory decline does not effect all types of episodic information to an equal extent, but that especially contextual memory and the integration of multiple features in memory deteriorate. The current study investigates contextual memory in a group of healthy young (N = 40) and older (N = 40) adults without dementia. All participants performed a computerized memory task assessing target memory (objects only), contextual memory (positions only) and memory for the combinations of two features (object, space, temporal order), that is, binding of target-context or context-context features. The results showed age-related decline on all task conditions. Furthermore, the performance on conditions requiring the binding of target and context features was affected to a greater extent in older adults compared to younger adults. These findings support the notion that a decline in contextual memory and binding might underlie poorer episodic memory in older participants.

Wayfinding is a complex cognitive function involving different types of information, such as knowledge about landmarks and direction information. This variety of processes suggest that multiple neural mechanisms are involved, e.g., the hippocampal system, the posterior parietal and temporal cortical areas. Although patient studies and imaging studies have given important insights in the exact neural circuitry underlying wayfinding, many controversies remain. Therefore, the current study sets out to further examine the neuroanatomical correlates of wayfinding in a sample of 31 stroke patients with unilateral lesions, tested with a series of different wayfinding tasks, including landmark recognition, landmark ordering, route reversal and route drawing. For all patients, the exact location of their lesion was determined using CT or MRI scans. Based on existing literature, a number of relevant brain areas were demarcated, after which the extent of damage to these areas was determined for each patient separately. Performance on the landmark recognition task was impaired by damage to the right hippocampal formation, whereas a weak correlation was found between damage to the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and processing the order of the landmarks. Several brain areas were found to be involved in retracing a route from the end to the beginning, including the right hippocampal formation, the right posterior parietal cortex, the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex and the right temporal lobe. Finally, damage to the right temporal lobe impaired the ability to draw the route.

There is evidence that the prevention of errors during learning might be helpful in improving an impaired memory performance, both in amnesia as well as in normal age-related memory decline. Although errorless learning is a promising technique for use in rehabilitation practice, the underlying mechanisms are unclear. That is, it has been suggested that the beneficial effects of errorless learning operate through implicit memory, whereas others implicate that it is explicit memory that is responsible for the enhanced memory performance after errorless learning. The current study examined the contribution of implicit and explicit memory function to the memory performance after errorless and errorful learning using the process-dissociation procedure. A group of young adults (N=40) was compared to a matched group of older individuals (N=40) on a spatial memory task (i.e., learning the locations of everyday objects in a room). The results clearly show age-related decline in explicit spatial memory, while implicit spatial memory was unaffected. Furthermore, the young group benefited from errorless learning compared to errorful learning, while the older group did not show a difference between the two learning conditions. Also, it was found that the effects of errorful learning were related to explicit memory function, and not implicit processing, corroborating and extending recent findings.

Elevated levels of the stress hormone cortisol are associated with increased episodic memory for emotional events. Elevated levels of cortisol are also seen in anxiety and depression disorders. Because it is well documented how both depression and anxiety are related to valence-specific biases in attention and memory, the present study sought to establish relations between basal cortisol levels and episodic memory for neutral, positive and negative stimuli. Thirty-nine healthy young women performed an immediate recall and long-term (20 min) version of a task measuring spatial memory for neutral, happy and fearful faces. The sample as a whole showed a valence-specific better performance for happy faces than for neutral faces in the immediate recall condition, and a better performance for all emotional faces in the long-term condition. Salivary cortisol measures were found to be related to better memory for emotional faces in the long-term condition. This relation to cortisol was not valence-specific and is similar to effects predicted by a model on long-term consolidation and the influence of cortisol in this process.

In the present study, a systematic comparison of sex differences for several tests of spatial memory was conducted. Clear evidence for more accurate male performance was obtained for precise metric positional information in a wayfinding task and in an object location memory task. In contrast, no sex difference characterized topological information processing (object-to-position assignment). Together, these findings provide further insight in the specificity of sex differences in spatial memory and in the functional architecture of spatial memory. Implications for the relevant evolutionary basis are discussed.

Objective: To compare the efficacy of errorless and errorful learning on memory performance in older people and young adults., Methods: Face-name association learning was examined in 18 older people and 16 young controls. Subjects were either prompted to guess the correct name during the presentation of photographs of unknown faces (errorful learning) or were instructed to study the face without guessing (errorless learning). The correct name was given after the presentation of each face in both task conditions. Uncued testing followed immediately after the two study phases and after a 10-minute delay., Results: Older subjects had an overall lower memory performance and flatter learning curves compared to the young adults, regardless of task conditions. Also, errorless learning resulted in a higher accuracy than errorful learning, to an equal amount in both groups., Conclusions: Older people have difficulty in the encoding stages of face-name association learning, whereas retrieval is relatively unaffected. In addition, the prevention of errors occurring during learning results in a better memory performance, and is perhaps an effective strategy for coping with age-related memory decrement.

The objective of this study was to present a quantitative review on the treatment effects of memory rehabilitation techniques based on intact implicit learning capacity in amnesic patients, that is, errorless learning and the method of vanishing cues. English-language journal articles focusing on these rehabilitation techniques were examined using MedLine (1966-2002) or PsychInfo (1887-2002), as well as additional papers listed in the references of these articles. Studies had to meet the following inclusion criteria: (1) original data were reported, (2) memory rehabilitation was studied in memory-impaired patients, (3) a control intervention was included, (4) exact scores were listed for both intervention conditions, or the exact statistics were presented. Studies were classified on the basis of the to-be-learned material and the method of intervention (errorless learning, vanishing cues, control intervention), patient characteristics were determined, and the tasks that were used were taken into account. Effect sizes and variances were computed for each individual study compared to control treatment using within-group statistics. A "large" and statistically significant ES was found for errorless learning treatment, but no significant ES was demonstrated for the vanishing cues method. The results of the present study show that the errorless learning technique is effective in amnesic patients. The effects on the vanishing cues method are only small (and nonsignificant).

There is evidence that object-location memory consists of three separate processes, that is, positional memory, binding of objects to locations, and a possible integration mechanism. A group of 26 patients with lesions following ischaemic stroke was studied to find evidence for selective impairments in these three processes using displays with pictures of everyday objects on different locations. Moreover, object-recognition memory and visuospatial construction was assessed. The Corsi Block-Tapping Task and Oxford Stylus Maze Test were included as standard spatial-memory tests. The results showed that of these 26 patients, 8 patients had selective impairments in the aforementioned object-location memory task conditions (both after immediate and delayed testing). These data further support the existence of separate cognitive processes within memory for object locations that can be selectively affected by cerebral dysfunction.

Functional neuroimaging studies suggest a role for the left angular gyrus (AG) in processes related to memory recognition. However, results of neuropsychological and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) studies have been inconclusive regarding the specific contribution of the AG in recollection, familiarity, and the subjective experience of memory. To obtain further insight into this issue, 20 healthy right-handed volunteers performed a memory task in a single-blind within-subject controlled TMS study. Neuronavigated inhibitory repetitive TMS (rTMS) was applied over the left AG and the vertex in a randomized and counterbalanced order. Prior to rTMS participants were presented with a list of words. After rTMS participants were shown a second list of words and instructed to indicate if the word was already shown prior to rTMS ("old") or was presented for the first time ("new"). In addition, subjectively perceived memory confidence was assessed. Results showed that recollection was unaffected following inhibitory left AG rTMS. In contrast, rTMS over the left AG improved both familiarity and the subjectively perceived confidence of participants that demonstrated low baseline memory recognition. Our study highlights the importance of taking into account individual differences in experimental designs involving noninvasive brain stimulation.

The brain has a high demand for energy, of which creatine (Cr) is an important regulator. Studies document neurocognitive benefits of oral Cr in mammals, yet little is known regarding their physiological basis. This study investigated the effects of Cr supplementation (3%, w/w) on hippocampal function in male C57BL/6 mice, including spatial learning and memory in the Morris water maze and oxygen consumption rates from isolated mitochondria in real time. Levels of transcription factors and related proteins (CREB, Egr1, and I?B to indicate NF-?B activity), proteins implicated in cognition (CaMKII, PSD-95, and Egr2), and mitochondrial proteins (electron transport chain Complex I, mitochondrial fission protein Drp1) were probed with Western blotting. Dietary Cr decreased escape latency/time to locate the platform (P < 0.05) and increased the time spent in the target quadrant (P < 0.01) in the Morris water maze. This was accompanied by increased coupled respiration (P < 0.05) in isolated hippocampal mitochondria. Protein levels of CaMKII, PSD-95, and Complex 1 were increased in Cr-fed mice, whereas I?B was decreased. These data demonstrate that dietary supplementation with Cr can improve learning, memory, and mitochondrial function and have important implications for the treatment of diseases affecting memory and energy homeostasis.

Spontaneous internally directed attention, such as mind wandering, typically hinders performance in cognitive tasks. The impact of intentional internally directed attention (IDA) – for instance, deliberately thinking about past or future events – on task performance, however, remains unclear. In our study, we employed a dual-task paradigm that involved self-referential stimuli in a color-recall visual working memory task. This approach revealed that intentional IDA more significantly influences performance compared to intentional externally directed attention (EDA). We observed larger late positive potentials (LPP) over medial frontal sensors, suggesting sustained stimulus processing over frontal sensors under IDA. Additionally, we noted a pattern of neural activity associated with internal attention: event-related desynchronization (ERD) in the alpha band (8-12 Hz) during the encoding phase and event-related synchronization (ERS) in the delay phase. In contrast, the EDA condition was marked by theta (4-8 Hz) band ERS during the delay period. These findings highlight distinct behavioral impacts and neural patterns associated with internally versus externally directed attention in dual-task settings.

In Visual working memory (VWM), the top-down goal selectively maintains and recalls items, while, bottom-up attention induced by perceptually similar items prioritizes recalling these VWM items. In this study, we focussed on whether repeated items have facilitated access in VWM and can also act as task-irrelevant interference hindering recalling task-relevant not-repeated items. In this VWM-based EEG study, human participants (n = 25) responded to a probe for an item’s presence or absence in a memory array containing repeated and not-repeated items. Significantly slower response times and poor accuracy were observed for probe matching for not-repeated items. Also, Event-related spectral perturbation analysis showed an increase in mid-frontal theta (4-7Hz) and parietal alpha power (8-12 Hz) demonstrating that default prioritized repeated items interfere with recalling items corresponding to the not-repeated probe matching. This study shows how default prioritized repeated items; a relational property of stimuli can interfere with recalling task-relevant VWM items.

Adequate and timely assessment of learning abilities in individuals with alcohol-related cognitive disorders is highly relevant to optimize addiction care. Learning curves of episodic verbal memory tests have been used to assess learning ability in various neurocognitive disorders, but studies in alcohol-related cognitive disorders are lacking. Therefore, this study investigated California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT) learning curves in individuals with alcohol-use disorder (AUD) with and without cognitive impairments and examined associations between learning curves and changes in everyday functioning following a multicomponent care program. We fitted learning curves over the five immediate recall trials of the Dutch version of the CVLT of patients with Korsakoff's syndrome (KS; N = 117), alcohol-related cognitive impairment no KS (ARCI; N = 147), and uncomplicated AUD (N = 43) using a generalized non-linear mixed regression. This model was based on three different parameters: initial memory performance (attention), maximum number of correctly recalled words (maximum learning), and the increase of correctly recalled words over the trials (learning rate). Next, we related these learning curves with ratings of everyday activities using the Patient Competency Rating Scale (PCRS) before and after a care program following admission. Modelled learning curves differed across groups, with significant differences in Attention (KS0.05). Although modelled learning curves may be used to differentiate diagnostic groups in alcohol-related cognitive disorders, future studies are needed to establish the criterion validity of learning curves in this population.

Both sleep spindles and slow oscillations have been implicated in sleep-dependent memory consolidation. Whereas spindles occur during both light and deep sleep, slow oscillations are restricted to deep sleep, raising the possibility of greater consolidation-related spindle involvement during deep sleep. We assessed declarative memory retention over an interval containing a nap and determined spindle density for light and deep sleep separately. In deep sleep, spindle density was considerably higher and showed a strong and robust positive correlation with retention. This relation was absent for light sleep, suggesting that the potentiating effects of spindles are tied to their co-occurrence with slow oscillations.

Object-location memory is an important form of spatial memory, comprising different subcomponents that each process specific types of information within memory, i.e. remembering objects, remembering positions and binding these features in memory. In the current study we investigated the neural correlates of binding categorical (relative) or coordinate (exact) position information with objects in memory. Therefore, an object-location memory battery was used, including different task conditions assessing object-location memory, i.e. memory for position information per se, and binding object information with coordinate and categorical position information. Sixty-one stroke patients with focal brain lesions were examined and compared with 77 healthy matched controls. The lesion subtraction method was used to define the area of overlap. Results indicate an important role of the left posterior parietal cortex in the binding of both categorical and coordinate positions with object information. Additionally, the hippocampus seems important for categorical object-location memory. This suggests that categorical and coordinate object-location memory depend on similar cognitive and neural systems. (Contains 3 tables and 5 figures.)

This experimental investigation replicates previous investigations of the effects of left margin screen background color hue to signal lesson sections on declarative knowledge and extends those investigations by adding a measure of structural knowledge. Participants (N = 80) were randomly assigned to receive 1 of 4 computer-based lesson treatments that consisted of color or no color lessons crossed with color or no color structural knowledge and declarative knowledge posttests. A disordinal interaction was observed, lesson color had a significant positive effect on the structural knowledge posttest (effect size d = 0.41) but had a non-significant effect on the declarative knowledge posttest (d = -0.17). A memory context effect was not observed. Designers of screen-based instructional materials should consider the commonsense notion that screen background color hues that signal lesson sections will tend to more strongly overlay the lesson organization onto the learner's memory organization. (Contains 2 tables and 1 figure.)

People are often inaccurate in predicting task duration. The memory bias explanation holds that this error is due to people having incorrect memories of how long previous tasks have taken, and these biased memories cause biased predictions. Therefore, the authors examined the effect on increasing predictive accuracy of correcting memory through supplying feedback for actual task duration. For Experiments 1 (paper-counting task) and 2 (essay-writing task), college students were supplied with duration information about their previous performance on a similar task before predicting task duration. For Experiment 3, participants were recruited at various locations, such as fast food restaurants and video arcades, and supplied with average task duration for others before predicting how long the task would take. In all 3 experiments, supplying feedback increased predictive accuracy. Overall, results indicate that, when predicting duration, people do well when they rely not on memory of past task duration but instead on measures of actual duration, whether their own or that of others. (Contains 7 tables and 2 figures.)

This study presents the first direct comparison of immediate serial recall in semantic dementia (SD) and transcortical sensory aphasia (TSA). Previous studies of the effect of semantic impairment on verbal short-term memory (STM) have led to important theoretical advances. However, different conclusions have been drawn from these two groups. This research aimed to explain these inconsistencies. We observed (a) qualitative differences between SD and TSA in the nature of the verbal STM impairment and (b) considerable variation within the TSA group. The SD and TSA patients all had poor semantic processing and good phonology. Reflecting this, both groups remained sensitive to phonological similarity and showed a reduced effect of lexicality in immediate serial recall. The SD patients showed normal serial position effects; in contrast, the TSA patients had poor recall of the initial list items and exhibited large recency effects on longer lists. The error patterns of the two groups differed: the SD patients made numerous phoneme migration errors whereas the TSA group were more likely to produce entire words in the wrong order, often initiating recall with terminal list items. The SD cases also showed somewhat larger effects of word frequency and imageability. We propose that these contrasting performance patterns are explicable in terms of the nature of the underlying semantic impairment. SD is associated with anterior lobe atrophy and produces degradation of semantic knowledge--this is more striking for less frequent/imageable items, accentuating the effects of these lexical/semantic variables in STM. SD patients frequently recombine the phonemes of different list items due to the reduced semantic constraint upon phonology (semantic binding: Patterson, K., Graham, N., & Hodges, J. R. (1994). The impact of semantic memory loss on phonological representations. "Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 6", 57-69). In contrast, the semantic impairment in TSA follows frontal or temporoparietal lesions and is associated with poor executive control of semantic processing (deregulated semantic cognition: Jefferies, E., & Lambon Ralph, M. A. (2006). Semantic impairment in stroke aphasia vs. semantic dementia: a case-series comparison. "Brain, 129", 2132-2147), explaining why these patients are liable to recall entire words out of serial order.

Research has demonstrated an advantage for the processing of self-associated stimuli for various mental functions (Sui & Humphreys, 2017). However, relatively little is known about whether prioritization exists for internal representations (Yin et al., 2019). In the current study, we first asked participants to associate social – labels ('self', ‘friend’, ‘stranger’) with arbitrary geometrical shapes (triangle, quadrilateral, and pentagon) (Sui et al., 2012) and then tested them for the maintenance of one or more features (shape, location, or a combination) of the target stimuli during a delayed match – to – sample task. In line with our expectations, our participants indeed showed a distinct advantage for self-associated stimuli for maintaining single features (identity, location) and a combination (shape & location). Our findings align with the proposal that self-reference may aid in binding information in working memory (Sui & Humphreys, 2015).

Purpose: The study aim was to develop a measure of self-reported quality of life (QoL) for people with mild to moderate dementia based on their views--the Bath Assessment of Subjective Quality of Life in Dementia (BASQID). Design and Methods: We developed the measure through multiple stages. Two field tests of the measure (ns = 60 and 150) enrolled people with dementia from a memory clinic, and we used the data to analyze the psychometric properties of the scale. Nested within this was a longitudinal investigation of 36 Alzheimer's disease patients prescribed with acetylcholinesterase inhibitors. Results: The BASQID contains 14 items assessing a range of QoL issues. Results showed that the BASQID satisfies the criteria of a valid, reliable, and acceptable assessment of subjective QoL. Scores were responsive to changes in QoL over 3 months. Low association between the BASQID and the Mini-Mental State Examination indicates that cognitive function may influence QoL but is an indirect measure of the QoL experienced during dementia. Implications: The BASQID provides a means of better understanding the experiences, perceptions, and beliefs of people with dementia. It does this through acknowledgement of the many influences on QoL over and above health status. Practitioners and researchers can use the BASQID alongside objective assessments of dementia to obtain a complete appraisal of a person's QoL. (Contains 2 footnotes, 4 tables, and 1 figure.)

This investigation considers the effects of learner-generated headings on memory. Participants (N = 63) completed a computer-based lesson with or without learner-generated text topic headings. Posttests included a cued recall test of factual knowledge and a sorting task measure of structural knowledge. A significant disordinal interaction was observed with the no headings group performing better on the cued recall test and worse on the structural knowledge sorting task. In addition, a measure of structural knowledge using a list-wise rating task was field trialed. The two structural knowledge tasks were analyzed using a Pathfinder network scoring technique that measured both linear and nonlinear text subtopic organization. The sorting and rating tasks were differentially sensitive to participants' linear and nonlinear knowledge organization. Unexpectedly, the sorting and rating posttest tasks improved cued recall posttest scores. The implications of the results for measuring structural knowledge are considered and suggestions for further studies are presented. (Contains 6 figures and 1 table.)

DNA methylation has emerged as a critical modulator of neuronal plasticity and cognitive function. Notwithstanding, the role of enzymes that demethylate DNA remain to be fully explored. Here, we report that loss of ten-eleven translocation methylcytosine dioxygenase 2 (Tet2), which catalyzes oxidation of 5-methylcytosine (5mC) to 5-hydroxymethylcytosine (5hmC), in adult neurons enhances cognitive function. In the adult mouse hippocampus, we detected an enrichment of Tet2 in neurons. Viral-mediated neuronal overexpression and RNA interference of Tet2 altered dendritic complexity and synaptic-plasticity-related gene expression in vitro. Overexpression of neuronal Tet2 in adult hippocampus, and loss of Tet2 in adult glutamatergic neurons, resulted in differential hydroxymethylation associated with genes involved in synaptic transmission. Functionally, overexpression of neuronal Tet2 impaired hippocampal-dependent memory, while loss of neuronal Tet2 enhanced memory. Ultimately, these data identify neuronal Tet2 as a molecular target to boost cognitive function.

Background: Previous models of the effects of feedback account for lower-order learning outcomes but do not adequately describe experimental findings for higher-order learning. Aims: Based on a connectionist model of feedback effects, this investigation aims to show that feedback that allows only one learner response facilitates proposition-specific verbatim encoding, while feedback that requires the learner to try again on error facilitates relational fuzzy encoding. Sample and methods: Volunteer high school students were randomly assigned to one of 5 print-based lesson treatments that consisted of four science expository texts with adjunct inference-level questions covering science principles. The five treatments included delayed feedback, single-try immediate feedback, multiple-try immediate feedback, and two control treatments, questions without feedback, and text only. A post-test given 5 days after instruction was designed to measure both verbatim and fuzzy outcomes. Results: Multiple-try immediate feedback was best for paraphrased post-test questions (fuzzy) and worse for verbatim post-test questions. Conclusions: Fuzzy trace theory complements a connectionist model of feedback, and may provide a fruitful approach for describing the effects of feedback on different learning outcomes.

In this experimental study, 44 undergraduates completed five computer-based instructional lessons and either two multiplechoice tests or two fill-in-the-blank tests. Color-coded borders were displayed during the lesson, adjacent to the screen text and illustrations. In the experimental condition, corresponding border colors were shown at posttest. In the control condition, border colors in the post test were mismatched with those used in the lesson. Participants were not informed of this color manipulation. Based on Tulving and Thomson's (1973) encoding specificity principle, the experimental group should remember significantly more content. Conversely, Murnane, Phelps, and Malmberg's (1999) ICE theory predicted that color-coding will have little effect on memory retrieval, since participants did not explicitly and actively integrate the topics with the color-coding scheme. Results generally favor ICE theory, however, the effects of practice/feedback varied by test format and color condition. A topic-color test measured the number of topic-color associations that were implicitly encoded and remembered. Gender and format differences were detected. (Contains 4 tables and 3 figures.)

People frequently underestimate how long it will take them to complete a task. The prevailing view is that during the prediction process, people incorrectly use their memories of how long similar tasks have taken in the past because they take an overly optimistic outlook. A variety of evidence is reviewed in this article that points to a different, although not mutually exclusive, explanation: People base predictions of future duration on their memories of how long past events have taken, but these memories are systematic underestimates of past duration. People appear to underestimate future event duration because they underestimate past event duration.

In the present study, a systematic comparison of sex differences for several tests of spatial memory was conducted. Clear evidence for more accurate male performance was obtained for precise metric positional information in a wayfinding task and in an object location memory task. In contrast, no sex difference characterized topological information processing (object-to-position assignment). Together, these findings provide further insight in the specificity of sex differences in spatial memory and in the functional architecture of spatial memory. Implications for the relevant evolutionary basis are discussed.

Colour is a common feature in computer-aided learning (CAL), though the instructional effects of screen colour are not well understood. This investigation considers the effects of different CAL study tasks with feedback on posttest performance and on posttest memory of the lesson colour scheme. Graduate students (n=68) completed a computer-based vocabulary lesson that included either multiple-choice or constructed-response study tasks with feedback. Each lesson section used a different colour theme, while the posttest did not use colour. The constructed-response study task was a little more effective for posttest memory of lesson content but was substantially less effective for posttest memory of the lesson colour scheme. These results show a clear interaction of screen colour and lesson study task, a memory-context effect. The practical and theoretical implications of these findings are discussed.