Response selection deficits in frontal excisions.
We compared the performance of patients with frontal excisions, patients with temporal excisions and controls in tasks involving speeded choice responses in which a number of variables were manipulated including: perceptual difficulty, stimulus and response set-size, associative complexity, and spatial stimulus-response compatibility. Response times were sensitive to all manipulations but did not show any group differences. The error rates of the three groups were equally affected by perceptual difficulty and response set-size but frontals were preferentially affected by spatial S-R compatibility, associative complexity, and the number of stimuli per response. The results are consistent with a basic deficit in response selection processes which could underly many problems produced by frontal lesions.
Décary
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Service de Neurologie, Hôpital Notre-Dame, Laboratoire de Neuroscience de la Cognition, Université du Québec à Montréal, Canada.
Richer
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D000328:Adult; D002755:Choice Behavior; D003657:Decision Making; D004827:Epilepsy / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000601:surgery; D005625:Frontal Lobe / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000601:surgery*; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D010775:Photic Stimulation; D011930:Reaction Time; D013028:Space Perception; D013702:Temporal Lobe / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000601:surgery*