A specific test of hippocampal deficit in schizophrenia.
Despite numerous studies in which hippocampal abnormalities were found, schizophrenia patients' hippocampal neural activity has not been systematically evaluated on a specific hippocampal-dependent task. The transverse-patterning task (TP) is sensitive to the relational mnemonic capabilities of the hippocampus. Ten schizophrenia patients and 10 controls performed TP and control tasks that are not hippocampal dependent. As predicted, patients displayed a behavioral impairment in TP and not in control tasks. Magnetoencephalography showed controls activating right hippocampus during TP performance. Patients showed more bilateral or left hippocampal activation during TP, and greater left lateralization was associated with better performance on TP. Patients' abnormal hippocampal lateralization may play a role in the hippocampal-dependent behavioral deficit.
Hanlon
Faith M
FM
Department of Psychiatry, New Mexico Veterans Affairs Health Care System, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131, USA. faithh@unm.edu
Weisend
Michael P
MP
Yeo
Ronald A
RA
Huang
Mingxiong
M
Lee
Ronald R
RR
Thoma
Robert J
RJ
Moses
Sandra N
SN
Paulson
Kim M
KM
Miller
Gregory A
GA
Cañive
Jose M
JM
D000328:Adult; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D001931:Brain Mapping; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D004192:Discrimination, Psychological / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006624:Hippocampus / Q000473:pathology / Q000503:physiopathology*; D006801:Humans; D015225:Magnetoencephalography / Q000379:methods; D008297:Male; D008569:Memory Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology*; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012559:Schizophrenia / Q000503:physiopathology*; D013223:Statistics as Topic