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Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has forced significant changes in clinical practice. Psychologists and neuropsychologists had to modify their settings to assess patients' abilities, switching from an in-person modality to a remote setting by using video calling platforms. Consequently, this change brought about the need for new normative data tailored to remote settings. Aim and methods: The study aimed to develop normative data for the online assessment of neuropsychological memory tests and to compare it with the published norms obtained in standard settings. Two hundred and four healthy Italian volunteers performed three verbal memory tests through the Google Meet platform: the Digit Span (Backward and Forward), the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning, and the Verbal Paired Associated Learning Test. Results: This research provides specific norms that consider the influence of demographic characteristics. Their comparison with published norms shows a medium to high agreement between systems. The present study provides a reference for the clinical use of neuropsychological instruments to assess verbal memory in a remote setting and offers specific recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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A sequence of spoken digits is easier to recall if the digits are grouped into smaller chunks (e.g., through the insertion of pauses). It has been claimed that intonation does not facilitate recall over and above the effect achieved by pauses. This may be related to the fact that past research has used synthesized intonation contours. In this replication study, we show that intonation does provide benefits once more naturalistic intonation contours are used. This benefit is independent of response modality (spoken responses, keyboard responses, or handwritten responses in a grid). We furthermore show that intonation differentially affects specific positions within the sequence of digits. Crucially, our results suggest that researchers and clinicians need to pay attention to intonation when assessing working memory using spoken language. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is well established that digit span in native Chinese speakers is atypically high. This is commonly attributed to a capacity for more rapid subvocal rehearsal for that group. We explored this hypothesis by testing a group of English-speaking native Mandarin speakers on digit span and word span in both Mandarin and English, together with a measure of speed of articulation for each. When compared to the performance of native English speakers, the Mandarin group proved to be superior on both digit and word spans while predictably having lower spans in English. This suggests that the Mandarin advantage is not limited to digits. Speed of rehearsal correlated with span performance across materials. However, this correlation was more pronounced for English speakers than for any of the Chinese measures. Further analysis suggested that speed of rehearsal did not provide an adequate account of differences between Mandarin and English spans or for the advantage of digits over words. Possible alternative explanations are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies using tests such as digit span and nonword repetition have implicated short-term memory across a range of developmental domains. Such tests ostensibly assess specialized processes for the short-term manipulation and maintenance of information that are often argued to enable longterm learning. However, there is considerable evidence for an influence of long-term linguistic learning on performance in short-term memory tasks that brings into question the role of a specialized short-term memory system separate from longterm knowledge. Using natural language corpora, we show experimentally and computationally that performance on three widely used measures of short-term memory (digit span, nonword repetition, and sentence recall) can be predicted from simple associative learning operating on the linguistic environment to which a typical child may have been exposed. The findings support the broad view that short-term verbal memory performance reflects the application of long-term language knowledge to the experimental setting. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous studies have found that congenitally blind individuals have better verbal memory than their normally sighted counterparts. However, it is not known whether this reflects superiority of verbal or memory abilities. In order to distinguish between these possibilities, we tested congenitally blind participants and normally sighted control participants, matched for age and education, on a range of verbal and spatial tasks. Congenitally blind participants were significantly better than sighted controls on all the verbal tasks but the groups did not differ significantly on the spatial tasks. Thus, the congenitally blind appear to have superior verbal, but not spatial, abilities. This may reflect greater reliance on verbal information and the involvement of visual cortex in language processing in the congenitally blind. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fragile X syndrome (FXS) is the most common inherited cause of intellectual disability. Although language delays are frequently observed in FXS, neither the longitudinal course of language development nor its cognitive predictors are well understood. The present study investigated whether phonological and working memory skills are predictive of growth in vocabulary and syntax in individuals with FXS during adolescence. Forty-four individuals with FXS (mean age = 12.61 years) completed assessments of phonological memory (nonword repetition and forward digit recall), verbal working memory (backward digit recall), vocabulary, syntax, and nonverbal cognition. Vocabulary and syntax skills were reassessed at a 2-year follow-up. In a series of analyses that controlled for nonverbal cognitive ability and severity of autism symptoms, the relative contributions of phonological and working memory to language change over time were investigated. These relationships were examined separately for boys and girls. In boys with FXS, phonological memory significantly predicted gains in vocabulary and syntax skills. Further, verbal working memory was uniquely associated with vocabulary gains among boys. In girls with FXS, phonological and working memory skills showed no relationship with language change across the 2-year time period. Our findings indicate that, for adolescent boys with FXS, acquisition of vocabulary and syntax may be constrained by the ability to maintain and manipulate phonological representations online. Implications for the identification and treatment of language disorders in this population are discussed. The present study is the first to identify specific cognitive mechanisms contributing to language growth over time in individuals with FXS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We investigated the role of number agreement on verb and of animacy in the comprehension of subject and object relative clauses in 51 monolingual Italian-speaking children, mean age 9:33, tested through a self-paced listening experiment with a final comprehension question. A digit span test and a listening span test were also administered to examine the role of memory in comprehension. Subject relative clauses were easier to comprehend than object relative clauses; animacy of the relative clause head improved comprehension of object relative clauses; memory, as measured by the digit span test, modulates comprehension of object relative clauses, both with animate and inanimate heads, as shown in response accuracy. Although all children process number agreement morphology on the verb, only some perform a correct reanalysis, as shown by the accuracy measures. We argue that number agreement disambiguation is particularly taxing for children, as it provides a negative symptom in the sense of Fodor and Inoue (J Psycholinguist Res 29(1):25-36, ) and reanalysis requires them to hold two dependencies in memory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis dysregulation predicts poor clinical and biochemical response to antidepressants. Antiglucocorticoids have therapeutic benefits but most have a troublesome adverse event profile. Aspects of neuropsychological performance, notably working memory, are susceptible to corticosteroid modulation and are impaired in depression. Aspirin has been shown to attenuate the adrenocorticotropic hormone (ACTH) and cortisol response to physiological challenge suggesting its potential to act as an augmenting agent in depression. To examine the effect of sub-acute (300 mg daily for 7 days) aspirin pre-treatment on the cortisol awakening response and the effect of acute (600 mg) and sub-acute aspirin on the neuroendocrine and neuropsychological response to the arginine vasopressin analogue, desmopressin. We demonstrated that aspirin pre-treatment did not attenuate the cortisol or ACTH response to desmopressin but, as hypothesised, significantly reduced the cortisol awakening response and improved working memory. Further studies to examine the impact of aspirin on neuropsychological performance and HPA axis function are warranted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Human cognition in normal and disease states is both environmentally and genetically mediated. Except for measures of language-specific abilities, however, few cognitive measures have been associated with specific genes or chromosomal regions. We performed genome-wide linkage analysis of five neuropsychological tests in the Collaborative Study on Genetics of Alcoholism sample. The sample included 1579 individuals (53% female, 76% White Non-Hispanic) in 217 families. There were 390 markers with mean intermarker distance of 9.6 cM. Performance on the Digit Symbol Substitution Test, a component of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-R, showed significant linkage to 14q11.2 and suggestive linkage to 14q24.2. This test of sustained visual attention also involves visual-motor coordination and executive functions. Performance on the WAIS-R Digit Span Test of immediate memory and mental flexibility showed suggestive linkage to 11q25. Although the validity of these results beyond populations with a susceptibility for alcohol dependence is unclear, these results are among the first linkage results for non-language components of cognition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following a brief history of Digit Span, a review of 27 articles, selected from 76, addresses the question of whether to scale Digits Forward and Backward separately. The review begins with studies involving Digits Forward, followed in turn by studies of Digits Backward and of both subtests. Finally, the loadings of four TOMAL subtests, Digits Forward and Backward and Letters Forward and Backward, undergo examination in the context of two, three, and four factor promax solutions, with corresponding varimax solutions provided for comparison. The analysis leads to several conclusions. Though Digits Forward and Backward show similarities, they load differently in the three and four factor solutions; Digits Backward also displays a spatial element, and perhaps a transformative element, not apparent in Digits Forward. Moreover, the differences between the two measures have important neurologic and diagnostic implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]