Department of Psychiatry, University of Illinois at Chicago, 1601 West Taylor Street, MC912, Chicago, IL 60612, USA.
Neuropsychologia. 2012 Jul;50(8):1823-9. doi: 10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2012.04.007. Epub 2012 May 4.
Verbal memory deficits attributed to late life depression (LLD) may result from executive dysfunction that is more detrimental to list-learning than story-based recall when compared to healthy aging. Despite these behavioral dissociations, little work has been done investigating related neuroanatomical dissociations across types of verbal memory performance in LLD. We compared list-learning to story-based memory performance in 24 non-demented individuals with LLD (age ~ 66.1 ± 7.8) and 41 non-demented/non-depressed healthy controls (HC; age ~ 67.6 ± 5.3). We correlated significant results of between-group analyses across memory performance variables with brain volumes of frontal, temporal and parietal regions known to be involved with verbal learning and memory. When compared to the HC group, the LLD group showed significantly lower verbal memory performance for spontaneous recall after repeated exposure and after a long-delay but only for the list-learning task; groups did not differ on story-based memory performance. Despite equivalent brain volumes across regions, only the LLD group showed brain associations with verbal memory performance and only for the list-learning task. Specifically, frontal volumes important for subjective organization and response monitoring correlated with list-learning performance in the LLD group. This study is the first to demonstrate neuroanatomical dissociations across types of verbal memory performance in individuals with LLD. Results provide structural evidence for the behavioral dissociations between list-learning and story-based recall in LLD when compared to healthy aging. More specifically, it points toward a network of predominantly anterior brain regions that may underlie the executive contribution to list-learning in older adults with depression.
由于晚年抑郁症（LLD）导致的言语记忆缺陷可能源于执行功能障碍，与健康衰老相比，当比较列表学习与基于故事的回忆时，它对列表学习的损害更大。尽管存在这些行为差异，但在 LLD 中，与言语记忆表现相关的神经解剖学差异的研究很少。我们比较了 24 名非痴呆的 LLD 患者（年龄约为 66.1 ± 7.8）和 41 名非痴呆/非抑郁的健康对照组（HC；年龄约为 67.6 ± 5.3）的列表学习和基于故事的记忆表现。我们将组间分析中记忆表现变量的显著结果与已知与言语学习和记忆有关的额、颞和顶叶区域的脑体积相关联。与 HC 组相比，LLD 组在重复暴露后和长时间延迟后自发回忆的言语记忆表现明显较低，但仅在列表学习任务中；两组在基于故事的记忆表现上没有差异。尽管跨区域的脑容量相等，但只有 LLD 组显示出与言语记忆表现相关的脑关联，而且仅与列表学习任务相关。具体来说，与主观组织和反应监测相关的额区体积与 LLD 组的列表学习表现相关。这项研究首次证明了 LLD 患者不同类型言语记忆表现的神经解剖学差异。结果为与健康衰老相比，LLD 中列表学习与基于故事的回忆之间的行为差异提供了结构证据。更具体地说，它指向一个主要位于前脑区域的网络，可能为抑郁老年人的列表学习中的执行功能贡献提供了基础。
