IngentaConnect Impaired spatial working memory in adults with attention-deficit/...

Authors: Dowson J.H.¹; McLean A.¹; Bazanis E.¹; Toone B.²; Young S.³; Robbins T.W.⁴; Sahakian B.J.¹

Source: Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, Volume 110, Number 1, July 2004 , pp. 45-54(10)

Abstract:

Dowson JH, McLean A, Bazanis E, Toone B, Young S, Robbins TW, Sahakian BJ. Impaired spatial working memory in adults with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder: comparisons with performance in adults with borderline personality disorder and in control subjects.

Acta Psychiatr Scand 2004: 110: 45–54. © Blackwell Munksgaard 2004. Objective:

This study investigated a previous claim that working memory may be ‘particularly impaired’ in adult attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), compared with other psychiatric disorders which affect frontal lobe-mediated executive functions. Method:

Performance on spatial working memory (SWM) and two additional tasks were investigated for adult patients selected on the basis of DSM-IV ADHD (n = 19), adult patients selected on the basis of borderline personality disorder (BPD) (n = 19), and non-clinical control subjects (n = 19). Groups were matched for age, verbal IQ and gender. Results:

Analysis of variance showed that the ADHD group had significant impairment of SWM performance relative to the non-clinical controls. Although there was a trend towards impairment in the BPD group relative to non-clinical controls, this did not reach significance. Conclusion:

The results are consistent with the claim that aspects of working memory are ‘particularly impaired’ in adult ADHD. Also, the BPD group had a longer deliberation time for one of the additional tasks, compared with the ADHD group, which indicated that the patient groups may have different patterns of neuropsychological impairments.

Keywords: attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder; neuropsychology; borderline personality disorder

Document Type: Research article

DOI: 10.1111/j.1600-0447.2004.00292.x

Affiliations: 1: Cambridge University Department of Psychiatry, Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge 2: Department of Psychological Medicine, Kings College Hospital, London 3: Department of Psychology, Institute of Psychiatry, London 4: Cambridge University Department of Experimental Psychology, Cambridge, UK

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