Study of verbal working memory in patients with Parkinson's disease

The authors examined the nature of the working memory deficit in persons with Parkinson's disease (PD). Three hypotheses were tested: a limited storage capacity, an impaired executive component, and a reduction of psychomotor speed. Verbal working memory was assessed in 14 PD patients without dementia and 14 matched control participants. Participants were administered a classical verbal span test, working memory tasks that required either updating or manipulation capacities, and motor and psychomotor speed tasks. Patients' performance was comparable to that of control participants on the verbal span test. However, results on the working memory tasks indicated a deficit in manipulation with normal updating capacities. Motor and psychomotor slowing were found in the patient group, but slowing could not fully account for the impairment observed in the manipulation task. Results indicated that there is a genuine but selective working memory impairment in patients with PD.