Simple and choice reaction time in patients with human immunodeficiency virus infection

Abstract

The performance of 56 homosexual men infected with human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) was compared to that of 23 HIV antibody-seronegative controls on simple (SRT) and choice (CRT) reaction time tasks. Patients were classified into 3 groups according to Centers for Disease Control clinical criteria. There were 18 patients who had acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), 18 who had AIDS-related complex (ARC), and 20 who were HIV antibody-seropositive but otherwise asymptomatic (HIV-Ab+). The SRT task consisted of 5 trials, each containing 10 target stimuli. The CRT task consisted of 10 trials, each containing 5 target stimuli randomly interspersed with 5 nontarget stimuli. The mean response latency of each of the patient groups on the SRT task was not significantly different from that of controls. However, the performance of patients with AIDS or ARC on the CRT task was significantly lower than that of controls, whereas that of HIV-Ab+ patients was not. Analysis of the quality of RT task performance also indicated that the impairment of processing efficiency at higher levels of task difficulty reflected a disruption of processing prior to the response selection stage.

Slowed Reaction Time in HIV-1-Seropositive Intravenous Drug Users without AIDS

“…Simple RT and choice RT may measure different aspects, as indicated by Miller et al [7], who, by means of a factor analysis and using the long version of the CalCap, found that the three iterations of simple RT clustered as a single factor, and the six choice RT measures formed a separate factor. Similar to the results of other studies [1, 5], we did not find any differences between seropositives and controls on error scores, which indicates that, with regard to choice RT measures, patients may be slower in processing the information, but they have the same accuracy as controls in the response selection stage.…”

“…Previous studies have found that AIDS patients perform worse than controls on computerized RT measures [1, 7]. Many studies have also found evidence of slower processing in asymptomatic seropositive individuals, which has been corroborated by psychophysiological studies.…”

“…They have been used to assess motor and cognitive impairment in HIV patients during various stages of the illness. An early report found that patients with AIDS and AIDS-related complex scored slower than controls did on a measure of choice RT [1]. The differences found between this measure and another of simple RT led these authors to conclude that impairment reflected a disruption of processing prior to the response selection stage.…”

“…No such agreement was reported with regard to asymptomatic seropositive individuals. Whereas some studies have shown that otherwise healthy HIV-positive persons score slower on RT tests and perform less well on motor functioning tests when compared with non-infected individuals [3, 4, 5, 6], other studies have failed to find differences between asymptomatic HIV patients and controls [1, 7]. …”

The neuropsychological profile of symptomatic AIDS and ADC patients in the pre-HAART era: A meta-analysis

“…Details of reports0samples included in the three meta-analyses SYMPTOMATIC HIV1 sample N CDC 87093 Treatment Ayers et al, 1987 Homosexual males 15 ARC NR Basso & Bornstein, 2000 Homosexual males 31 CDC B1-B2 21 on ART Bornstein et al, 1993 Homosexual or bisexual men 61 ARC NR Gibbs et al, 1990 Homosexual men 20 ARC 87 14 on AZT Grant et al, 1987 Homosexual men 13 ARC NR Heaton et al, 1995 Homosexual or bisexual men 86 CDC B 70.9 % on ART Jansen et al, 1989 Homosexual bisexual men 26 ARC 87 NR Krikorian and Wrobel, 1991 Homosexual bisexual men 18 ARC NR Martin et al, 1992 Male and female military personnel 15 Symptomatic NR Perdices & Cooper, 1989 Homosexual and bisexual men 18 ARC On AZT Perdices & Cooper, 1990 Homosexual Note. HIV 5 human immunodeficiency virus; CDC 5 Centers for Disease Control; NR 5 not reported; AIDS 5 acquired immunodeficiency syndrome; ARC 5 AIDS-related complex; ART 5 antiretroviral treatment; AZT, azidothymidine; ZDV 5 zidovudine; DDI 5 didanosine; DDC 5 dideoxycytidine; NVP 5 nevirapine; ADC 5 AIDS dementia complex; HAD 5 HIV-associated dementia; AAN 5 American Academy of Neurology.…”