title: Spatial grouping activity in children with early cortical and subcortical lesions.
abstract: Spatial construction skills were examined in 3- to 5-year-old children with prenatal or perinatal focal brain injury. In earlier work, a dissociation was reported between children with injury to the right hemisphere and the left hemisphere, right-hemisphere injury resulting in significantly lower levels of performance. In the current paper, the effect of isolated unilateral subcortical injury was explored. Thirty-four children with early focal brain injury were tested in a task which required them to copy a series of simple block constructions. There were approximately equal numbers of children with right-hemisphere and left-hemisphere injury; within each of these groups approximately half of the children had injury involving only subcortical regions. Consistent with the earlier work, children with right-hemisphere injury performed significantly below children with left-hemisphere injury and the normal controls. Importantly, no differences were observed between the children with isolated subcortical injury and children with injury involving both cortical and subcortical brain areas.
authors.affiliation: Ospedale Pediatrico Bambino Gesù, Santa Marinella, Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Vicari
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Stiles
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Stern
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Resca
mesh_terms: D001072:Apraxias / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D002544:Cerebral Infarction / Q000150:complications* / Q000473:pathology*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010468:Perceptual Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D013028:Space Perception