Disturbances of long-term memory in aphasic patients. A comparison of anterior and posterior lesions.
The performance of 20 aphasic patients on a verbal list-learning task was examined in relation to site of lesion, as documented by CT scan. Patients with lesions of the inferior frontal lobe and/or the basal ganglia were severely impaired in both acquisition and long-term retention of the list, while the performance of patients with posterior temporoparietal involvement was nearly normal. These results contrasted sharply with scores on short-term memory tests by the same patient groups which showed an opposite trend. The findings support a functional and neuroanatomical dissociation of short and long-term memory systems and suggest that neural connections of the inferior frontal lobe and the basal ganglia may be crucial for initiating the retrieval process.
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001037:Aphasia / Q000473:pathology*; D001479:Basal Ganglia / Q000473:pathology; D001921:Brain / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000473:pathology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008569:Memory Disorders / Q000473:pathology*; D008570:Memory, Short-Term; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D014706:Verbal Learning