Article

Does lateral parietal cortex support episodic memory? Evidence from focal lesion patients.

Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Centre, Toronto, Canada.
Neuropsychologia (impact factor: 3.64). 02/2008; 46(7):1743-55. DOI:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2008.01.011 pp.1743-55
Source: PubMed

ABSTRACT Although neuroimaging and human lesion studies agree that the medial parietal region plays a critical role in episodic memory, many neuroimaging studies have also implicated lateral parietal cortex, leading some researchers to suggest that the lateral region plays a heretofore underappreciated role in episodic memory. Because there are very few extant lesion data on this matter, we examined memory in six cases of focal lateral parietal damage, using both clinical and experimental measures, in which we distinguished between recollection and familiarity. The patients did not have amnesia, but they did show evidence of disrupted recollection on an anterograde memory task. Although the exact mechanisms remain to be elucidated, lateral parietal damage appears to impair some aspects of episodic memory.

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Keywords

anterograde memory task
 
aspects
 
cases
 
clinical
 
critical role
 
elucidated
 
episodic memory
 
experimental measures
 
focal lateral parietal damage
 
heretofore underappreciated role
 
human lesion studies
 
lateral parietal cortex
 
lateral parietal damage
 
lateral region
 
medial parietal region
 
neuroimaging studies
 
recollection