1,721,019 research outputs found
Vertical neglect: Behavioral and electrophysiological data
No full textBoth behavioral and electrophysiological methods were used to assess altitudinal neglect. In the first experiment, 100 patients with neglect completed Albert's Barrage test. Most omissions were present in the lower left quadrant. In 16 patients, visual evoked potentials to stimuli in the four quadrants were separately recorded (Exp. 2). Latencies in the lower left quadrant were longer than those in the other quadrants. A third experiment provided electrophysiological normative data from 13 young normal subjects. Overall, the results showed that both the horizontal and vertical dimensions of space are affected in neglect patients
Influence of the radial and vertical dimensions on lateral neglect
No full textThe influence of radial (near-far) and vertical (upper-lower) dimensions on lateral visuo-spatial neglect was studied using two horizontal line-bisection tasks (one motor and one perceptual). A group of 15 patients with neglect and a group of 14 right-brain damaged patients without neglect were examined. This latter group was used to define the range of variability in line-bisection performance that was independent of neglect. For the radial dimension, some neglect patients showed greater errors in far space than in near space (for both stimuli presented in the upper and lower space). Fewer patients showed the opposite pattern (i.e., greater errors for near-space stimuli). These near-far asymmetries were present for both the motor and perceptual, conditions and showed a good degree of intra-individual consistency. This finding contradicts the hypothesis that the motor component is critical for yielding such asymmetry. For the vertical dimension, the results indicated that neglect patients make more bisection errors for lower-space stimuli than for upper-space stimuli. This vertical asymmetry was nearly always confined to stimuli in near space. Asymmetries along the vertical dimension were present for both perceptual and motor conditions, although intra-individual consistency was low. When perceptual and motor conditions were directly compared, several neglect patients showed greater errors in the perceptual than in the motor task
MODULATION OF THE ROD-AND-FRAME ILLUSION BY ADDITIONAL EXTERNAL STIMULI
No full textThe presence of an additional external upright frame was studied in three experiments to separate the role of visuovestibular, global, and local mechanisms in the rod-and-frame illusion (RFI). In the first experiment, carried out in a dark room, the external frame surrounded a large tilted frame. Rod-setting errors to the vertical were abolished with the additional-frame condition (at 22 degrees inner-frame tilt) confirming earlier findings. However, small, residual direct (at 11 degrees inner-frame tilt) and indirect effects (at 33 degrees inner-frame tilt) were still present, indicating the persistence of global visual processing. In the second experiment, the RFI in the dark was compared with the RFI with the lights on. Turning the light on abolished the effect at 22 degrees and 33 degrees frame tilt; however, a small direct effect was maintained at 11 degrees frame tilt. These two studies indicate that the addition of veridical vertical information abolishes the effect owing to visuovestibular mechanisms. In the third experiment, a small rod and frame was used with the lights on (a condition abolishing visual-vestibular interaction). In the case of a small gap between the rod and the inducing frame (a condition which maximises local processing), the effect of the outer upright frame was negligible; this indicates that the additional frame had no effect on local processing. In the case of a large gap (a condition which minimises local processing), the external square reduced the illusion, indicating its modulating effect on visual global processing. Overall, an upright external frame exerts a differential influence depending on which mechanisms contribute most to the RFI in a given experimental condition
Isolating global and specific factors in developmental dyslexia: a study based on the rate and amount model (RAM)
No full textUsing the reading-age match approach, research on developmental dyslexia focuses on specific (e.g., phonological) deficits and disregards the possible role of global influences in determining the disturbance. In the present study, we set out to investigate the role of both global and specific factors in Italian developmental dyslexics using the rate-amount model (RAM; Faust et al. in Psychol Bull 125:777-799, 1999). Vocal reaction times (RT) in naming pictures, words and non-words of varying length were measured in a group of 26 sixth- to eighth-grade dyslexics and 81 age-matched control readers. Dyslexics' raw RTs showed greater lexicality (longer RTs to non-words than words) and length (longer RTs to long stimuli than short ones) effects than controls'. We found that one global factor predicted most individual variation in naming words and non-words, but not pictures. When data transformations, effective in controlling for the global factor, were applied to the data, the greater lexicality effect in dyslexics vanished, due to the influence of the global factor and not a specific failure in the non-lexical reading procedure. Conversely, the greater length effect in dyslexics persisted. Overall, dyslexics' reading performance was best explained as due to the influence of both a global factor for processing orthographic material prelexically and to the specific influence of stimulus length. This conceptualisation appears more promising for bridging the gap between behavioural and functional imaging studies than traditional approaches, which focus on the detection of specific reading deficits. It is concluded that RAM is a useful tool for disentangling the components that are impaired in reading and for defining the characteristics of the global factor, because the paradigm is more powerful for studying developmental dyslexia than the reading-age match method
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Neglect for low luminance contrast stimuli but not for high colour contrast stimuli: A behavioural and electrophysiological case study
No full textWE describe a patient with a right hemisphere lesion involving the frontal lobe, the post-central gyrus and the superior parietal lobule. Behavioural testing demonstrated severe left unilateral neglect to low luminance contrast stimuli, but not to high colour contrast stimuli. Evoked potentials to Ion contrast luminance gratings presented in the left hemifield were not reliable. However, equiluminant coloured gratings presented in the same hemifield evoked reliable electrophysiological responses, although longer in latency than those evoked in the right hemifield. These findings su patient has severe damage of the high contrast sensitivity magnocellular pathway in the right hemisphere,with minor involvement of the parvocellular pathway
Letter and letter-string processing in developmental dyslexia
No full textThis study evaluated letter recognition processing in Italian developmental dyslexics and its potential contribution to word reading Letter/bigram recognition (naming and matching) and reading of words and non words were examined A group of developmental dyslexics and a chronologically age matched group of skilled readers were examined Dyslexics were significantly slower than skilled readers in all tasks The rate and amount model (RAM Faust et al 1999) was used to detect global and specific factors in the performance differences controlling for the presence of over additivity effects Two global factors emerged One ( letter string factor) accounted for the performance in all (and only) word and non word reading conditions indicating a large impairment in dyslexics (more than 100% reaction time - RT increase as compared to skilled readers) All the letter/bigram tasks clustered on a separate factor ( letter factor) indicating a mild impairment (ca 20% RT increase as compared to skilled readers) After controlling for global factor influences by the use of the z score transformation specific effects were detected for the letter string (but not the letter) factor Stimulus length exerted a specific effect on dyslexics performance with dyslexics being more affected by longer stimuli furthermore dyslexics showed a stronger impairment for reading words than non words Individual differences in the letter and letter string factors were uncorrelated pointing to the independence of the impairments The putative mechanisms underlying the two global factors and their possible relationship to developmental dyslexia are discussed (C) 2009 Elsevier Sri All rights reserve
The eye-voice lead during oral reading in developmental dyslexia
No full textIn reading aloud, the eye typically leads over voice position. In the present study, eye movements and voice utterances were simultaneously recorded and tracked during the reading of a meaningful text to evaluate the eye-voice lead in 16 dyslexic and 16 same-age control readers. Dyslexic children were slower than control peers in reading texts. Their slowness was characterized by a great number of silent pauses and sounding-out behaviors and a small lengthening of word articulation times. Regarding eye movements, dyslexic readers made many more eye fixations (and generally smaller rightward saccades) than controls. Eye movements and voice (which were shifted in time because of the eye-voice lead) were synchronized in dyslexic readers as well as controls. As expected, the eye-voice lead was significantly smaller in dyslexic than control readers, confirming early observations by Buswell (1921) and Fairbanks (1937). The eye-voice lead was significantly correlated with several eye movements and voice parameters, particularly number of fixations and silent pauses. The difference in performance between dyslexic and control readers across several eye and voice parameters was expressed by a ratio of about 2. We propose that referring to proportional differences allows for a parsimonious interpretation of the reading deficit in terms of a single deficit in word decoding. The possible source of this deficit may call for visual or phonological mechanisms, including Goswami's temporal sampling framework
Length effect in word naming in reading: Role of reading experience and reading deficit in Italian readers
No full textVocal reaction times (RTs) in naming 3- to 8-letter words were measured in proficient and dyslexic readers (Study 1). In proficient readers, RTs were independent of word length up to 5-letter words, indicating parallel processing. In the 5- to 8-letter range, RTs increased linearly, indicating sequential processing. Reading experience was associated with both faster discrimination of individual elements and parallel processing of increasingly large word parts. In dyslexics, RTs increased linearly with increasing length indicating reliance on sequential decoding. Individual analysis indicated 2 profiles of RTs (Types A and B). In Study 2, the distinction between A and B dyslexics was not associated with the use of different reading procedures. However, a more marked speed deficit characterized Type B dyslexics
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