[The recall of information from memory by patients with memory disorders]

The way amnesics perform in a verbal fluency task was the subject of this study. More in particular the question was raised if amnesics (N = 15) would organize the semantic category (animals) in semantic fields as a strategy in the retrieval of category exemplars. It was shown that word production was deficient in comparison with normative data (Groninger Intelligence Test). A qualitative analysis of the retrieval process revealed that there was only a minor number of clusters in the protocols. It was concluded that amnesics searched for individual words. A cued retrieval condition yielded significant better results.