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Abnormal parietal cortex activation during working memory in schizophrenia: verbal phonological coding disturbances
Deanna M Barch1, John G Csernansky
1Department of Psychology, Washington University, St. Louis, MO 63130, USA. dbarch@artsci.wustl.edu
The American Journal of Psychiatry
|July 4, 2007
Summary
Individuals with schizophrenia exhibit working memory deficits due to impaired activation in brain regions supporting central executive functions, not domain-specific storage. This impacts both verbal and nonverbal tasks.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Cognitive Psychology
- Psychiatry
Background:
- Working memory is crucial for cognitive function.
- Schizophrenia is associated with significant working memory impairments.
- Previous research suggests abnormal prefrontal and parietal cortex activation in schizophrenia during working memory tasks.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate whether abnormal prefrontal and parietal cortex activation in schizophrenia during working memory tasks is linked to phonological coding (verbal-specific) or domain-general executive processes.
- To differentiate the roles of ventral (phonological) and dorsal (executive) prefrontal and parietal regions in schizophrenia's working memory deficits.
Main Methods:
- Functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) was used to scan 57 medicated individuals with schizophrenia and 120 healthy controls.
- Participants performed verbal and nonverbal 2-back working memory tasks.
- Brain activation patterns in prefrontal and parietal cortices were analyzed.
Main Results:
- Healthy subjects showed bilateral dorsal prefrontal/parietal activation for both tasks and greater left ventral prefrontal/parietal activation for verbal tasks.
- Individuals with schizophrenia displayed bilateral deficits in dorsal frontal and parietal activation during both verbal and nonverbal tasks.
- Schizophrenia patients showed typical ventral prefrontal/parietal activity for verbal vs. nonverbal tasks, but reduced verbal superiority in a left ventral region.
Conclusions:
- Working memory deficits in schizophrenia are primarily associated with impaired activation of brain regions supporting central executive functions.
- The findings suggest that deficits lie in domain-general executive processing rather than domain-specific storage buffers.
- Abnormalities in dorsal prefrontal and parietal regions are key to understanding working memory dysfunction in schizophrenia.
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