Assessment of visual memory: a comparison of Chinese characters and geometric figures as stimulus materials

The study compared the suitability of geometric figures and Chinese characters for assessing visual memory. In Study 1, 40 Chinese characters were found to be significantly less verbalisable than were 40 geometric figures from the Biber Figure Learning Test. In Study 2, memory for Chinese characters, for Biber figures, and for items on the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test were compared using 14 subjects with left cerebrovascular accident, 15 subjects with right cerebrovascular accident, and 29 matched controls. Subjects in the left hemisphere group showed impairment on the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test but not on Chinese characters, whereas subjects in the right hemisphere group showed impairment on Chinese characters but not on the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test. This double dissociation was not evident when comparisons involved the Biber Figure Learning Test. The Chinese character set used in this study was thus judged to be more suitable than were geometric figures in the Biber Figure Learning Test for assessing visual memory.