Prism adaptation and perceptual skill learning deficits in early-stage Parkinson's disease

Skill learning deficits in Parkinson's disease (PD) at an early stage are not well known, and findings in behavioral studies with mirror reading and prism adaptation tasks are mixed. Moreover, skill learning over several days in PD patients has not been studied.

A total of 12 nondemented early-stage PD patients and 12 age-matched normal control subjects participated in this study. The Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R) was applied to all subjects to assess declarative memory. The mirror reading task of horizontally presented kana letters and the reversed vision task using a prism were performed throughout 3 consecutive days.

For the mirror reading skill, the early-stage PD patients showed significantly increased mirror reading time on days 2 and 3. For the prism adaptation, the PD patients performed significantly more slowly in reversed vision than the normal controls, specifically at blocks 1 and 2, over 3 days. The WMS-R subscores did not show a significant correlation with the reaction times in reversed vision or with the mirror reading times.

Using two tasks with different modalities, the present study revealed visuomotor adaptation deficits and acquisition/retention deficits, especially in the later phase of perceptual skill learning, in early-stage PD patients.