Tone duration discrimination in Parkinson's disease.
Patients with Parkinson's disease (PD) and healthy controls took a computerized test of tone duration discrimination (TDD) using pairs of tones of 0.4-1.6 sec duration, presented at intervals of 0.5-4 sec. In PD patients as well as controls, TDD was impaired by even slight degrees of cognitive deterioration. PD yielded impaired TDD in females, but not in males. This suggests that the dopamine-powered biological clock, which is vulnerable to PD, is more important for the processing of durations in the 1-sec range in women than in men.
Hellström
A
A
Stockholm University, Department of Psychology, Sweden. hellst@psychology.su.se
Lang
H
H
Portin
R
R
Rinne
J
J
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D004298:Dopamine / Q000502:physiology; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010300:Parkinson Disease / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D010897:Pitch Discrimination / Q000502:physiology*; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D013998:Time Perception / Q000502:physiology*
D004298:Dopamine