Lateralized Brain Dysfunction in Depression: Analysis of Memory

Abstract

This study was designed to investigate the hypothesized association between non-dominant hemispheric dysfunction and depressive illness. Twenty-eight depressed inpatients, fourteen nonpsychiatric controls, and one right temporal lesioned control were administered both a verbal and visual list learning task with restrictive reminding. Each test consisted of four recall trials (employing a percent correct measure) and two recognition probes (employing a d' measure). Items to be remembered were names of animals on the verbal task and moderately complex designs on the visual task. Standardized difference scores (verbal-visual) were determined to control for motivational confounds and individual performance levels.