Specific temporal-lobe signs and enhanced delayed cross-modal matching performance.
Structural damage to the amygdala severely retards delayed cross-modal (tactile-to-sight) matching in primates. Conversely, we hypothesized that people who display signs suggestive of specific temporal lobe lability should show enhanced delayed cross-modal matching performance. The hypothesis was supported. In a single experiment involving 25 subjects, significant negative correlations obtained between the numbers of errors on the cross-modal matching task and numbers of affirmative responses within clusters of items that contained themes of meaningfulness, religious beliefs or ictal, complex partial epileptic (limbic) states. On the other hand, the numbers of errors were not significantly correlated with either clusters of control items or items that are presumed to reflect the function of other temporal-lobe structures. Both matching and questionnaire data were collected under double-blind conditions.
D000328:Adult; D000679:Amygdala / Q000502:physiology; D004193:Discrimination Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D005556:Form Perception / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013236:Stereognosis / Q000502:physiology*; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000502:physiology*