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Working memory impairments extend to non-verbal domains in post-stroke aphasia.

Seçkin Arslan1, 2*, Semra Selvi Balo3, Lucie Broc1, 2, İlknur Maviş3, Fanny Meunier1, 2 and Fabien Mathy1, 2
  • 1 Université Côte d'Azur, France
  • 2 UMR7320 Bases,corpus, langage (BCL), CNRS, France
  • 3 Anadolu University, Faculty of Health Sciences, Türkiye

This preliminary study investigated verbal and visuospatial memory in aphasia. The presence of memory limitations in persons with post-stroke aphasia (PWA) has been well documented (Caplan, Michaud, & Hufford, 2013; Nickels, Howard, & Best, 1997; Salis, Kelly, & Code, 2015; Sung et al., 2009). Short-term memory (STM) refers to the capacity of storing information for a temporary duration while working memory (WM) refers to the capability to compute more complex processes with the information stored (Baddeley, 2003). Previous research has shown that verbal WM capacity is impaired in PWA; however, results from studies on visuospatial WM capacity are inconsistent. Some authors have found memory deficits in the verbal domain but not in the visuospatial one, arguing that the amount of linguistic information in WM tasks modulates PWA’s memory performance (Christensen & Wright, 2010; Christensen, Wright, & Ratiu, 2018). Others have shown that memory impairments in aphasia are not specific to verbal information and extend to visuospatial domains (Mayer & Murray, 2012; Potagas, Kasselimis, & Evdokimidis, 2011). We explored STM/WM capacity in eight Turkish-speaking post-stroke PWA (three females, mean post-onset = 24 months, age = 59) and 10 non-brain-damaged controls (NBDs, six females, age = 46.5). To measure verbal STM/WM capacity, we used digit span tasks (Wechsler, 2008) in forward and backward order of recall, administered in repetition and pointing versions. To measure the visuospatial STM/WM capacity, the Corsi block-tapping task (Corsi, 1972) was used. Table 1 presents mean span scores and the total number of correctly recalled items for both the PWA and NBDs. The outputs from a set of generalized mixed-effects regression models showed that the PWA performed comparably to the NBDs in their visuospatial STM (i.e. forward recall), evidenced by both the span and total number of correctly recalled items. Nonetheless, the PWA performed more poorly than the NBDs in the backward visuospatial recall, as well as in verbal pointing and repetition span tasks independent of the order of recall (see Figure 1A). Further analyses showed that the PWA had reduced verbal span in pointing (ß = -0.63, SE = 0.29, z = -2.11, p = 0.03) and repetition tasks (ß = -0.69, SE = 0.30, z = -2.27, p = 0.02) as compared to the visuospatial task. No order effect or interaction effects were observed (all ps >0.17). Importantly, we found significant positive correlations between the PWA’s span length and their language assessment outcomes from auditory comprehension, object naming, and word repetition tasks (see Figure 1B). We conclude that the storage capacity for the non-verbal (i.e. visuospatial) domain is virtually intact in aphasia. However, complex visuospatial processing, as measured with backward recall, and both storage and complex processing capacities for verbal information were impaired in our group of PWA. This is consistent with the claim that WM capacity is central to the processing of both verbal and non-verbal information, which is affected in aphasia. We argue that impairments in WM capacity in aphasia are not specific to verbal domains but extend to complex processing of visuospatial information.

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Acknowledgements

This study is supported by an Initiative of Excellence (IDEX) young researcher grant awarded to Seckin Arslan by the French Government through the National Research Agency (ANR), and the University of Côte d’Azur [ANR-15-IDEX-01], and partly by an Academy of Korean Studies research grant [AKS-2019-R22].

References

Baddeley, A. (2003). Working memory and language: An overview. Journal of communication disorders, 36(3), 189-208. Caplan, D., Michaud, J., & Hufford, R. (2013). Short-term memory, working memory, and syntactic comprehension in aphasia. Cognitive neuropsychology, 30(2), 77-109. Christensen, S. C., & Wright, H. H. (2010). Verbal and non-verbal working memory in aphasia: What three n-back tasks reveal. Aphasiology, 24(6-8), 752-762. Christensen, S. C., Wright, H. H., & Ratiu, I. (2018). Working memory in aphasia: Peeling the onion. Journal of Neurolinguistics, 48, 117-132. Corsi, P. (1972). Memory and the medial temporal region of the brain. McGill University, Montreal. Mayer, J. F., & Murray, L. L. (2012). Measuring working memory deficits in aphasia. Journal of Communication Disorders, 45(5), 325-339. Nickels, L., Howard, D., & Best, W. (1997). Fractionating the articulatory loop: Dissociations and associations in phonological recoding in aphasia. Brain and Language, 56(2), 161-182. Potagas, C., Kasselimis, D., & Evdokimidis, I. (2011). Short-term and working memory impairments in aphasia. Neuropsychologia, 49(10), 2874-2878. Salis, C., Kelly, H., & Code, C. (2015). Assessment and treatment of short‐term and working memory impairments in stroke aphasia: a practical tutorial. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 50(6), 721-736. Sung, J. E., McNeil, M. R., Pratt, S. R., Dickey, M. W., Hula, W. D., Szuminsky, N. J., & Doyle, P. J. (2009). Verbal working memory and its relationship to sentence‐level reading and listening comprehension in persons with aphasia. Aphasiology, 23(7-8), 1040-1052. Wechsler, D. (2008). Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale–Fourth Edition (WAIS–IV): San Antonio, TX: The Psychological Corporation.

Keywords: Post-stroke aphasia, working memory, short-term memory, verbal memory, visuospatial memory

Conference: Academy of Aphasia 57th Annual Meeting, Macau, Macao, SAR China, 27 Oct - 29 Oct, 2019.

Presentation Type: Poster presentation

Topic: Not eligible for student award

Citation: Arslan S, Selvi Balo S, Broc L, Maviş İ, Meunier F and Mathy F (2019). Working memory impairments extend to non-verbal domains in post-stroke aphasia.. Front. Hum. Neurosci. Conference Abstract: Academy of Aphasia 57th Annual Meeting. doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2019.01.00065

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Received: 02 May 2019; Published Online: 09 Oct 2019.

* Correspondence: Dr. Seçkin Arslan, Université Côte d'Azur, Nice, France, seckin1984@gmail.com