[[Category:Synesthesia Symposium]]

Introduction to WO
WO has lexical synesthesia, which means that achromatic words and alphanumeric characters are seen in bright and consistent colors. The subject, WO has experienced this form of synesthesia since childhood and describes that he experiences a visual imagery synesthesia in which spoken words evoke consistent colors in “his mind’s eye” (Pamleri et al., 2000, p.4127). Despite his synesthesia, he has normal trichromatic color vision, good stereopsis and normal visual acuity.

Method and Results
The authors tested WO’s synesthesia as elicited by both local and global forms. (i.e. a large number “5” made of small “2s”) Depending on what the subject was attending to, the local or global form of the stimulus, WO experienced whatever color was consistently associated with that stimulus (i.e. light green for the “5” and orange for the “2s”). WO also elicited synesthesia in response to stereopic displays resulting from binocularly defined stimuli. The structure-from-motion defined stimuli, which consisted of arrows facing in different directions, which formed the percept of a number. WO readily demonstrated synesthesia by identifying the color for the number displayed. Palmeri et al. (2000) also conducted a modified stroop interference task in which WO was asked to name colors either congruent or incongruent with the ink color, using latency as the independent variable. WO showed significantly slower reaction time when the written color was incongruent with his synesthesia. In another modified stroop task WO was asked to name the color of the word, which was either congruent or incongruent with the colors normally evoked by his synesthetic experience. The reaction times evoked to name words printed in grey (control condition) had similar durations to the words printed in the appropriate synesthetic color. The final task included a visual search efficiency test consisting of comparable visual stimuli (i.e. a “2” among numerous “5s” or a “6” among numerous “8s”). The results showed that WO’s error rates and reaction times were significantly lower and than that of controls and he commented that the target number was easily distinguishable compared to the other digits.

Discussion

Synesthesia is an automatic condition that results in multimodal perceptual experiences from a unimodal sensory stimulus. Palmeri et. al. (2000) reported, “it appears that the binding of color and form takes place during the process of form recognition itself, with synesthetic colors available before the explicit recognition of the digits (p. 4130). The authors conclude that lexical synesthesia binds color to form before the synesthete consciously recognizes the stimulus. Thus, it seems that synesthesia occurs during central visual processing, instead during higher order, semantic processing.

See also: [[Synesthesia]]

Wechsler adult intelligence scale

Kgutekunst — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:40:46 GMT

Kgutekunst:

[[Category:Neuropsychological methods]]
The Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R) is the most standard assessment for measuring intellectual functioning. Its subtests include: Information, Picture completion, Digit Span, Picture arrangement, Vocabulary, Block design, Arithmetic, Object assembly, Comprehension, Digit symbol, and Similarities.

Wechsler adult intelligence scale

Kgutekunst — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:40:15 GMT

Kgutekunst:

[[Category:Neuropsychological methods]]
The Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised (WAIS-R) is the most standard assessment for measuring intellectual functioning. Its subtests include: Information, Picture completion, Digit Span (F), Digit Span (B), Picture arrangement, Vocabulary, Block design, Arithmetic, Object assembly, Comprehension, Digit symbol, and Similarities.

Kgutekunst — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 17:00:04 GMT

Kgutekunst:

Wernicke's area

Kgutekunst — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 16:57:41 GMT

Kgutekunst:

File:Wernickesarea.gif

Kgutekunst — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 16:57:00 GMT

Kgutekunst:

Kgutekunst — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 04:40:45 GMT

Kgutekunst: /* References */

[[Category:Neuropsychological syndromes]]
Amnesia is a memory deficit, resulting from brain damage, disease, or injury. Memory loss may be selective or generalized, temporary or permanent, and it may affect short-term memory, long-term memory, or both.
Research for amnesia is does not have the ability to be experimentally manipulated. Therefore, amnesia information is reliant on amnesic individuals who volunteer for research.

== Diencephalic Amnesia ==
Damage to the diencephalic structues also has the ability to lead to memory impairments. Cases of diencephalic amnesia were used in a study by Knowlton et. al. hypothesizing separate but parallel learning systems. In patients with amnesia, either with damage to the hippocampal formation or diencephalic midline, participants performed normally on a probabilistic classification task. However, scores for a declarative memory task were poor. The results were opposite for participants with Parkinson's disease. These results demonstrate declarative memory is dependent on the medial temporal lobe or diencephalon, but not on the neostriatum. The opposite is the case for probabilistic classification learning.

A 'pure' case of diencephalic amnesia comes in the form of NA. After suffering a freak accident involving a fencing foil, NA had damage to his left dorsal thalamus, his mamillary bodies (bi-laterally), and his mamillo-thalamic tract. He showed normal short-term memory, but was severely impaired in declarative long-term memory, particularly for verbal material.

== Global Amnesia ==
Global amnesia is usually a result of bilateral damage to structures on the internal aspects of the cerebral hemispheres. It is characterized by an inability to learn/retain new information, including verbal, nonverbal, visual, or auditory, as well as a period of retrograde amnesia. Those suffering from Korsakoff's disease as well as patients who survive herpes simplex encephalitis may demonstrate global amnesia.

== Frontal Amnesia ==
Frontal amnesia is characterized as memory deficits resulting from frontal lobe damage. Typically, the patient is impaired in learning and recalling new information.

== Korsakoff's Syndrome ==
[[http://editthis.info/psy3241/Korsakoff%27s_syndrome]]

== Concussion Amnesia ==
Concussion-induced amnesia almost always results in ''temporary'' memory impairment, unless there was organic damage to the brain. A typical case may include both anterograde (after on-set) amnesia and retrograde (before accident) amnesia. A unique feature of concussion amnesia is that memory loss usually is partially recovered with time, although there is nearly always some permanent loss. There may be impairments in the consolidation of new information from short-term to long-term memory.

== ECT-Induced Amnesia ==
Electroconvulsive therapy involves the induction of epileptic seizures by electric current. ECT-induced amnesia resembles that of concussion amnesia. There is both anterograde and retrograde amnesia, but also shrinkage over time.

== References ==
Knowlton, B. J., Mangels, J. A., & Squire, L. R. (1996). A neostriatal habit learning system in humans. ''Science, 273''(5280), 1399-1402.
Stirling, J. (2002). ''Introducing neuropsychology.'' New York: Psychology Press.
Ogden, J. A. (2005). ''Fractured minds.'' New York: Oxford University Press.