The Modality Effect on Delayed Free Recall in Non-demented Patients With Mild Parkinson’s Disease Progression

Abstract

Background : The modality effect plays the central role in learning and memory functions. Retrieval failure constitutes a common memory impairment that occurs among patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD). However, little knowledge exists about the relation between modality effect and delayed recall impairment in PD. The primary goal of this study was to compare delayed free recall performance between three different memory modalities (verbal, visual, and cross visual-verbal) in a sample of non-demented patients with mild PD progression. The secondary goal was to explore the frequency of deficient performance on the basis of normative comparisons on each of the three delayed free-recall measures. Method : A total of 71 non-demented patients with mild PD progression were recruited for the administration of the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test (RAVLT), the Rey Osterrieth Complex Figure Test (ROCFT), and the Greek Version of Face-Name Associative Memory Examination (GR-FNAME12). Results : The percentages of deficient-performances for the three delayed free recall measures were 45.1% (32/71), 39.4% (28/71) and 31% (22/71) for the GR-FNAME12, ROFCT and RAVLT, respectively. The results indicated no significant difference between performances of the GR-FNAME12 and ROCFT, both of which were significantly lower than performance on the RAVLT. Conclusions : In conclusion, delayed free recall appears to be more severely affected in the cross visual-verbal and visual memory modalities than in verbal-memory modalities in the early phase of PD progression.

Overview of the Complex Figure Test and Its Clinical Application in Neuropsychiatric Disorders, Including Copying and Recall

“…Since the subthalamic nucleus plays a vital role in optimal planning, planning defects are related to the dysfunction of the frontal basal ganglia network (regulatory response inhibition) ( 51 ). PD patients also performed poorly on the ROCF delayed recall, which was explained as memory retrieval failure due to the destruction of the frontostriatal loop ( 52 ). Visuospatial impairment is also an early feature of PD-MCI, and figure copying tests have been shown to predict the progressive cognitive decline of PD, such as pentagons and cubes ( 53 ).…”