Neuropsychology final exam review

What is explicit memory?

Conscious long-term memory including episodic and semantic memory.

What is implicit memory?

Unconscious memory for skills, habits, priming, conditioning.

What is emotional memory?

Memory for fear, reward, and affective value mediated by the amygdala.

What supports short-term/working memory?

Frontal cortex plus dorsal and ventral streams.

What is anterograde amnesia?

Inability to form new memories after injury.

What is retrograde amnesia?

Loss of memories acquired before injury.

Which memories are most vulnerable in retrograde amnesia?

The most recent memories.

What memory problems are common after TBI?

Retrograde amnesia, posttraumatic amnesia, impaired prospective memory.

What causes childhood amnesia?

Late maturation of explicit memory systems.

What is confabulation?

Unintentional fabrication to fill memory gaps.

What causes Korsakoff’s disease?

Alcohol-related thiamine deficiency.

What is category-specific amnesia?

Loss of knowledge for one category but not others.

What is episodic memory?

Personal event memory with autonoetic awareness.

What is semantic memory?

General factual knowledge.

Which hippocampal region encodes details?

Posterior hippocampus.

Which hippocampal region encodes gist?

Anterior hippocampus.

What was spared in H.M.?

IQ, perception, motor skill learning.

What was impaired in H.M.?

Severe anterograde + graded retrograde amnesia.

What did H.M.’s case show?

Explicit and implicit memory are separate.

What was impaired in K.C.?

Complete loss of episodic memory and future imagining.

What was preserved in K.C.?

Semantic memory and normal intelligence.

What did K.C.’s case show?

Episodic and semantic memory dissociate.

What was unique about M.L.’s amnesia?

Dense retrograde episodic loss from ventral PFC/uncinate lesion.

What is preserved in early hippocampal damage?

Semantic memory, intelligence, language.

What is impaired in early hippocampal damage?

Episodic memory and spatial memory.

What are the major hippocampal structures?

CA1–CA4 and the dentate gyrus.

Which hippocampal region is most vulnerable to anoxia?

CA1.

What is the perforant path?

Input from posterior cortex → entorhinal cortex → hippocampus.

What is the fimbria-fornix?

Hippocampal output pathway.

What happens when the fornix is damaged?

Memory deficits similar to hippocampal loss.

What does large hippocampal damage cause?

Longer retrograde amnesia.

What supports remote memories when hippocampus is damaged?

Adjacent cortex.

What do perirhinal/entorhinal cortices do?

Provide input to the hippocampus.

What do right temporal lesions impair?

Faces, spatial tasks, Corsi blocks.

What do left temporal lesions impair?

Verbal recall and verbal span.

What does the HERA model say?

Left PFC encodes

What do frontal lesions impair?

Strategic encoding, retrieval, autobiographical memory.

What is preserved in amnesic patients?

Skill learning and priming.

What system supports procedural learning?

Basal ganglia circuits.

What does Huntington’s disease impair?

Implicit skill learning.

What does Parkinson’s disease impair?

Well-learned routines and motor sequences.

What does the cerebellum mediate?

Conditioned eyeblink responses.

What does the amygdala mediate?

Fear conditioning and emotional learning.

What happens after amygdala damage?

Loss of emotional memory with intact explicit/implicit memory.

What does emotional salience do?

Enhances encoding and retention.

What did K.F. show?

Poor verbal short-term memory but intact long-term memory.

What do frontal lesions impair in WM?

Interference control and stimulus-response maintenance.

Which stream supports spatial WM?

Dorsal frontal stream.

Which stream supports object WM?

Ventral prefrontal stream.

What is HSAM?

Highly Superior Autobiographical Memory.

What is SDAM?

Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory.

What do SDAM individuals rely on?

Semantic memory rather than episodic recall.

What is Systems Consolidation?

Memories transfer from hippocampus to neocortex.

What is Multiple Trace theory?

Episodic memory always involves the hippocampus.

What is Reconsolidation?

Recall destabilizes memory and rewrites it.

What is Trace Transformation?

Memories shift from detail → gist.

What is Scene Construction?

Hippocampus builds coherent mental scenes.

What are phonemes?

Smallest speech sound units.

What are morphemes?

Smallest meaningful units.

What is syntax?

Rules for combining words.

What is prosody?

Rhythm, stress, and intonation.

What does FOXP2 mutation cause?

Articulatory sequencing problems similar to Broca’s aphasia.

What does ape language research show?

Symbolic learning but no true grammar.

What does the McGurk effect show?

Visual cues influence speech perception.

What does the dorsal pathway do?

Sound-to-articulation mapping and repetition.

What does the ventral pathway do?

Sound-to-meaning mapping and comprehension.

Which pathway handles nonsense word repetition?

Dorsal.

Which pathway handles semantic meaning?

Ventral.

What is fluent aphasia?

Normal prosody with poor meaning/comprehension.

What is nonfluent aphasia?

Effortful, agrammatic speech.

What causes Wernicke’s aphasia?

Posterior temporal damage.

What causes Broca’s aphasia?

Left inferior frontal damage.

What is conduction aphasia?

Impaired repetition with good fluency/comprehension.

What is anomic aphasia?

Word-finding difficulty.

What is global aphasia?

Severe production and comprehension deficits.

What is alexia?

Loss of reading ability.

What is agraphia?

Loss of writing ability.

What is word deafness?

Inability to understand spoken words despite normal hearing.

What is attentional dyslexia?

Errors when multiple letters/words are present.

What is neglect dyslexia?

Misreading one side of words.

What is letter-by-letter reading?

Reading by spelling out each letter.

What is deep dyslexia?

Semantic errors and inability to read nonwords.

What is phonological dyslexia?

Nonword reading impairment.

What is surface dyslexia?

Difficulty with irregular words

What are the goals of neuropsych assessment?

Determine functioning, localize deficits, guide treatment.

What are the biopsychosocial factors?

Biological, psychological, social.

Examples of biological factors?

Disease history, surgeries, meds, substance use.

Examples of psychological factors?

Coping, mood, stress.

Examples of social factors?

Education, finances, environment.

What is Halstead–Reitan?

A fixed standardized test battery.

What is Luria–Nebraska?

Standardized version of Luria’s approach.

What is Boston Process Approach?

Flexible testing with error analysis.

What does CANTAB measure?

Memory, attention, executive functions.

What does ANAM measure?

Concussion and cognitive performance.

What does FSIQ measure?

Overall cognitive ability.

What does VCI measure?

Verbal reasoning and knowledge.

What does PRI measure?

Nonverbal reasoning.

What does WMI measure?

Working memory.

What does PSI measure?

Processing speed.

What is the GAI?

VCI + PRI composite less affected by WMI/PSI.