Browsing by Subject "Brain damage"

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    Exploring social cognition in patients with apathy following acquired brain damage
    (2014-01-23) Njomboro, Progress; Humphreys, Glyn W; Deb, Shoumitro
    Abstract Background Research on cognition in apathy has largely focused on executive functions. To the best of our knowledge, no studies have investigated the relationship between apathy symptoms and processes involved in social cognition. Apathy symptoms include attenuated emotional behaviour, low social engagement and social withdrawal, all of which may be linked to underlying socio-cognitive deficits. Methods We compared patients with brain damage who also had apathy symptoms against similar patients with brain damage but without apathy symptoms. Both patient groups were also compared against normal controls on key socio-cognitive measures involving moral reasoning, social awareness related to making judgements between normative and non-normative behaviour, Theory of Mind processing, and the perception of facial expressions of emotion. We also controlled for the likely effects of executive deficits and depressive symptoms on these comparisons. Results Our results indicated that patients with apathy were distinctively impaired in making moral reasoning decisions and in judging the social appropriateness of behaviour. Deficits in Theory of Mind and perception of facial expressions of emotion did not distinguish patients with apathy from those without apathy. Conclusion Our findings point to a possible socio-cognitive profile for apathy symptoms and provide initial insights into how socio-cognitive deficits in patients with apathy may affect social functioning.
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    Toward an index of premorbid intellectual functioning : investigation of the National Adult Reading Test (NART) in a neurologically unimpaired South African sample
    (1989) Struben, Edward Adam Marinus; Oxtoby, Richard
    The utility of the National Adult Reading Test (NART) as a predictor of premorbid intellectual functioning is dependent on its ability to adequately predict IQ from irregular word reading ability. The primary aim of this study is the replication, on a South African sample, of the findings reported by Nelson (1977 unpub. manuscript) in her standardisation study. A total of 234 subjects are divided into groups according to language usage and availability/type of IQ score and utilised in a correlational study which investigates the psychometric characteristics of the NART and the degree of correspondence between predicted and observed I.Q. values. The research yields regression formulae for the prediction of IQ from performance on the NART. While correlation coefficients obtained for English speaking subjects do not differ significantly from those derived from Nelson's data (1977 unpub. manuscript), it is concluded that the use of the test for Afrikaans subjects is not justified. Satisfactory reliability and validity characteristics reported for the sample utilised in this study suggest that the instrument can be usefully applied under local conditions. An investigation of 24 potential additional items for the test does not yield encouraging results. The lack of an adequate model explaining the mechanisms underlying the functioning of the test is addressed, and a number of areas of interest for further research are identified.