Leplow B, Tetzlaff K, Höll D, Zeng L, Reuter M
Department of Psychology, Martin-Luther-University of Halle-Wittenberg, Brandbergweg 23, 06120 Halle, Germany.
Int Arch Occup Environ Health. 2001 Apr;74(3):189-98. doi: 10.1007/s004200000155.
The purpose of this work was to investigate whether or not navigation abilities are impaired in construction divers and if putative deficits can be related to MRT-verified brain lesions and/or to diving experience.
Nineteen construction divers and 19 controls matched for age, intelligence, and socioeconomic background were studied by use of a "locomotor search through" task which resembled working conditions at ground. The task incorporated a spatial working memory and a spatial reference memory component. Moreover, navigation parameters (i.e., rotational turns, distances traveled, speed of navigation) were derived from the participant's locomotor behavior, which was recorded automatically. Groups were compared by navigation performance, standard neuropsychological tests, and the number of brain lesions obtained by MRT-scans.
Divers were widely comparable with respect to neuropsychological test scores, exploration behavior and speed of navigation during testing. Performance deficits in divers were seen in the three test trials with respect to the number of reference memory errors and navigation behavior. Only in controls were age and the number of MRI-verified lesions related to neuropsychological test performance and to maze variables, but in divers the number of lesions seemed to be related to hyperbaric exposure.
Despite possible positive selection effects in long-term construction divers, these results may have implications for health care of middle-aged divers who are exposed to critical depths of more than 60 meter sea water (msw).
本研究旨在调查建筑潜水员的导航能力是否受损，以及假定的缺陷是否与磁共振成像（MRT）证实的脑部病变和/或潜水经验有关。
对19名建筑潜水员和19名年龄、智力和社会经济背景相匹配的对照组人员进行研究，采用一项类似于地面工作条件的“运动搜索穿越”任务。该任务包含空间工作记忆和空间参考记忆成分。此外，导航参数（即旋转转弯、行进距离、导航速度）从参与者的运动行为中得出，并自动记录。通过导航表现、标准神经心理学测试以及MRT扫描获得的脑部病变数量对两组进行比较。
在神经心理学测试分数、测试期间的探索行为和导航速度方面，潜水员与对照组广泛可比。在三项测试试验中，潜水员在参考记忆错误数量和导航行为方面存在表现缺陷。仅在对照组中，年龄和MRI证实的病变数量与神经心理学测试表现及迷宫变量相关，但在潜水员中，病变数量似乎与高压暴露有关。
尽管长期建筑潜水员可能存在积极的选择效应，但这些结果可能对暴露于超过60米海水深度（msw）的中年潜水员的医疗保健具有启示意义。
