The Primacy Effect in Amnestic Mild Cognitive Impairment: Associations with Hippocampal Functional Connectivity.
Background:The "primacy effect," i.e., increased memory recall for the first items of a series compared to the following items, is reduced in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI). Memory task-fMRI studies demonstrated that primacy recall is associated with higher activation of the hippocampus and temporo-parietal and frontal cortical regions in healthy subjects. Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) at resting state revealed that hippocampus functional connectivity (FC) with neocortical brain areas, including regions of the default mode network (DMN), is altered in aMCI. The present study aimed to investigate whether resting state fMRI FC between the hippocampus and cortical brain regions, especially the DMN, is associated with primacy recall performance in aMCI.Methods:A number of 87 aMCI patients underwent resting state fMRI and verbal episodic memory assessment. FC between the left or right hippocampus, respectively, and all other voxels in gray matter was mapped voxel-wise and used in whole-brain regression analyses, testing whether FC values predicted delayed primacy recall score. The delayed primacy score was defined as the number of the first four words recalled on the California Verbal Learning Test. Additionally, a partial least squares (PLS) analysis was performed, using DMN regions as seeds to identify the association of their functional interactions with delayed primacy recall.Results:Voxel-based analyses indicated that delayed primacy recall was mainly (positively) associated with higher FC between the left and right hippocampus. Additionally, significant associations were found for higher FC between the left hippocampus and bilateral temporal cortex, frontal cortical regions, and for higher FC between the right hippocampus and right temporal cortex, right frontal cortical regions, left medial frontal cortex and right amygdala (p< 0.01, uncorr.). PLS analysis revealed positive associations of delayed primacy recall with FC between regions of the DMN, including the left and right hippocampus, as well as middle cingulate cortex and thalamus (p< 0.04). In conclusion, in the light of decreased hippocampus function in aMCI, inter-hemispheric hippocampus FC and hippocampal FC with brain regions predominantly included in the DMN may contribute to residual primacy recall in aMCI.
German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) - Rostock Rostock, Germany.
Katharina
K
Brueggen
Department of Psychosomatic Medicine, University of Rostock Rostock, Germany.
Elisabeth
E
Kasper
German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) - Rostock Rostock, Germany.
Martin
M
Dyrba
School of Natural Sciences and Psychology, Liverpool John Moores University Liverpool, UK.
Davide
D
Bruno
Nathan Kline Institute for Psychiatric ResearchOrangeburg, NY, USA; Department of Psychiatry, School of Medicine, New York UniversityNew York City, NY, USA.
Nunzio
N
Pomara
Institute for Stroke and Dementia Research, Klinikum der Universität München, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) Munich, Germany.
Michael
M
Ewers
Institute for Stroke and Dementia Research, Klinikum der Universität München, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU) Munich, Germany.
Marco
M
Duering
Institute for Stroke and Dementia Research, Klinikum der Universität München, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität (LMU)Munich, Germany; German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE)Munich, Germany.
Katharina
K
Bürger
German Center for Neurodegenerative Diseases (DZNE) - RostockRostock, Germany; Department of Psychosomatic Medicine, University of RostockRostock, Germany.
Stefan J
SJ
Teipel
Alzheimer's disease (AD); default mode network; functional connectivity; hippocampus; mild cognitive impairment (MCI); primacy effect