Wms-r patterns among patients with unilateral brain lesions

Abstract

The effects of unilateral brain lesions on memory functioning were examined among a sample of 115 patients with well lateralized lesions using the new Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R). Multivariate analysis of the WMS-R age-corrected summary indexes for the patients with right-(n = 56) and left-(n = 59) hemisphere lesions was significant (p<.008), although subsequent univariate comparisons revealed that only the Verbal Memory Index was significant (p<.009). Multivariate analysis of the 13 individual WMS-R subtest scores was also significant (p<.03), with four univariate group comparisons being significant at p<.05. Because the WMS-R offers verbal and nonverbal analogs for five memory dimensions (span of memory, immediate and delayed recall of complex material, and immediate and delayed paired associate learning), it was possible to examine the subjects modality-specific performance patterns using a repeated measures MANOVA. The results yielded a significant multivariate interaction (p<.004), with the two patient groups showing a double dissociation of memory function on four of the five memory dimensions. As expected, patients with left-hemisphere lesions were more adept as learning and retaining nonverbal/visual material than comparable verbal material, whereas the right-hemisphere group manifested the opposite pattern. These results lend support to the new WMS-R as a multivarite measure of modality-specific memory functioning.