title: Route learning in Korsakoff's syndrome: Residual acquisition of spatial memory despite profound amnesia.
abstract: Korsakoff's syndrome (KS) is characterized by explicit amnesia, but relatively spared implicit memory. The aim of this study was to assess to what extent KS patients can acquire spatial information while performing a spatial navigation task. Furthermore, we examined whether residual spatial acquisition in KS was based on automatic or effortful coding processes. Therefore, 20 KS patients and 20 matched healthy controls performed six tasks on spatial navigation after they navigated through a residential area. Ten participants per group were instructed to pay close attention (intentional condition), while 10 received mock instructions (incidental condition). KS patients showed hampered performance on a majority of tasks, yet their performance was superior to chance level on a route time and distance estimation tasks, a map drawing task and a route walking task. Performance was relatively spared on the route distance estimation task, but there were large variations between participants. Acquisition in KS was automatic rather than effortful, since no significant differences were obtained between the intentional and incidental condition on any task, whereas for the healthy controls, the intention to learn was beneficial for the map drawing task and the route walking task. The results of this study suggest that KS patients are still able to acquire spatial information during navigation on multiple domains despite the presence of the explicit amnesia. Residual acquisition is most likely based on automatic coding processes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.|Slingedael Korsakoff Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Erik
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Oudman
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Stefan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Van der Stigchel
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.|Brain Center Rudolf Magnus, Center of Excellence for Rehabilitation Medicine, University Medical Center Utrecht and De Hoogstraat Rehabilitation, The Netherlands.|Department of Neurology, Brain Center Rudolf Magnus, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Tanja C W
authors.initials: TC
authors.lastname: Nijboer
authors.affiliation: Slingedael Korsakoff Center, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Jan W
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Wijnia
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Maaike L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Seekles
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, Helmholtz Institute, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.|Department of Neurology, Brain Center Rudolf Magnus, University Medical Center Utrecht, The Netherlands.
authors.forename: Albert
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Postma
mesh_terms: D000647:Amnesia / Q000150:complications* / Q000523:psychology*; D001288:Attention; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D020915:Korsakoff Syndrome / Q000150:complications* / Q000523:psychology*; D007858:Learning; D008297:Male; D000070587:Mental Navigation Tests; D008875:Middle Aged; D065852:Spatial Memory
keywords: Amnesia; Korsakoff's syndrome; Spatial navigation; automatic memory; implicit memory; motor learning; procedural memory