Univ. Lille, CNRS, CHU Lille, UMR 9193 - SCALab - Sciences Cognitives et, Sciences Affectives, France.
Department of Geriatrics, Tourcoing Hospital, France.
Chem Senses. 2017 Dec 25;43(1):27-34. doi: 10.1093/chemse/bjx064.
Research suggests that odors may serve as a potent cue for autobiographical retrieval. We tested this hypothesis in Alzheimer's disease (AD) and investigated whether odor-evoked autobiographical memory is an involuntary process that shares similarities with music-evoked autobiographical memory. Participants with mild AD and controls were asked to retrieve 2 personal memories after odor exposure, after music exposure, and in an odor-and music-free condition. AD participants showed better specificity, emotional experience, mental time travel, and retrieval time after odor and music exposure than in the control condition. Similar beneficial effects of odor and music exposure were observed for autobiographical characteristics (i.e., specificity, emotional experience, and mental time travel), except for retrieval time which was more improved after odor than after music exposure. Interestingly, regression analyses suggested executive involvement in memories evoked in the control condition but not in those evoked after music or odor exposure. These findings suggest the involuntary nature of odor-evoked autobiographical memory in AD. They also suggest that olfactory cuing could serve as a useful and ecologically valid tool to stimulate autobiographical memory, at least in the mild stage of the disease.
研究表明，气味可能是自传体检索的有力线索。我们在阿尔茨海默病（AD）中检验了这一假设，并研究了气味诱发的自传体记忆是否是一种与音乐诱发的自传体记忆相似的无意识过程。轻度 AD 患者和对照组被要求在气味暴露后、音乐暴露后以及无气味和音乐的情况下回忆 2 个个人记忆。AD 患者在气味和音乐暴露后表现出更好的特异性、情绪体验、心理时间旅行和检索时间，而在对照组中则表现不佳。气味和音乐暴露对自传体特征（特异性、情绪体验和心理时间旅行）也有类似的有益影响，除了检索时间，气味暴露后的检索时间比音乐暴露后更有改善。有趣的是，回归分析表明，在对照组中，记忆的唤起涉及到执行功能，而在音乐或气味暴露后则没有。这些发现表明，AD 患者的气味诱发的自传体记忆是无意识的。它们还表明，嗅觉提示可以作为一种有用的、具有生态有效性的工具来刺激自传体记忆，至少在疾病的轻度阶段是如此。
