Relational integration and executive function in Alzheimer's disease.
Executive functions depend on the ability to represent relations between objects and events, and the prefrontal cortex provides the neural substrate for this capacity. Patients with probable Alzheimer's disease (AD) and control participants were administered measures of working memory and reasoning that varied systematically in their relational complexity. AD patients showed impairment on reasoning measures that required the online integration of relations but performed as well as control participants on nonrelational items and items requiring the processing of only single relations. When AD patients were divided into subgroups based on their performance on relational reasoning measures, the subgroup that showed significant impairment on relational integration measures exhibited a neuropsychological profile consistent with prefrontal cortical dysfunction.
Waltz
James A
JA
Departjment of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1563, USA.
Knowlton
Barbara J
BJ
Holyoak
Keith J
KJ
Boone
Kyle B
KB
Back-Madruga
Carla
C
McPherson
Susan
S
Masterman
Donna
D
Chow
Tiffany
T
Cummings
Jeffrey L
JL
Miller
Bruce L
BL
D000368:Aged; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000503:physiopathology / Q000523:psychology; D003210:Concept Formation / Q000502:physiology*; D004193:Discrimination Learning / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008570:Memory, Short-Term / Q000502:physiology*; D008609:Mental Status Schedule / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D009949:Orientation / Q000502:physiology; D010364:Pattern Recognition, Visual / Q000502:physiology*; D017397:Prefrontal Cortex / Q000503:physiopathology*; D011340:Problem Solving / Q000502:physiology*; D011594:Psychometrics; D011930:Reaction Time; D015203:Reproducibility of Results