Graduation Year
2013
Document Type
Dissertation
Degree
Ph.D.
Degree Granting Department
Psychology
Major Professor
Cynthia R. Cimino
Keywords
Cognition, Cognitive Rehabilitation, Executive Functioning, Frontal Lobes, Neuropsychology
Abstract
The primary aim of this study was to investigate source memory performance in individuals diagnosed with Parkinson's disease (PD). The secondary goal was to explore how memory was impacted when subjects were asked to generate responses during encoding. Fifty idiopathic PD patients and fifty healthy control subjects completed a task measuring item memory and source memory which also included a generation manipulation. Relative to controls, PD patients exhibited deficits in source memory but not item memory. Both groups demonstrated enhanced memory performance in the generative condition of the item memory task. The PD group displayed a marginally significant trend toward improvement in source memory when instructed to generate a response. These findings lend support to the notion of a selective pattern of source memory impairment in PD, highlighted by a dissociation between item and source memory performance. Generative tasks may be related to increased activation of key frontal regions that facilitate memory performance. These results could inform new perspectives for cognitive rehabilitation in PD, although further research is necessary.
Scholar Commons Citation
Oelke, Lynn Elizabeth, "Source Memory and Generation Effects in Parkinson's Disease" (2013). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/4552
