Authors
Minshew NJ. Goldstein G.
Institution
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pennsylvania, USA. minshewnj@msx.upmc.edu
Title
The pattern of intact and impaired memory functions in autism.
Source
Journal of Child Psychology & Psychiatry & Allied Disciplines. 42(8):1095-101,
2001 Nov.
Abstract
A battery of tests of auditory and visual memory was used to investigate
memory function in 52 high-functioning adolescents and young adults with
autism and 40 group-matched normal controls. It was hypothesized that memory
dysfunction is present in autism but is not modality specific and is produced
by poor utilization of organizing strategies. It was therefore hypothesized
that memory impairment in autism would become more prominent as task complexity
was increased. The participants with autism performed as well as controls
on short-term memory and paired-associate learning tasks, but performed
significantly less well than controls on a list learning task. They also
performed significantly more poorly on immediate and delayed recall of a
story and of a complex geometric figure. On a maze learning task, their
performance became progressively worse relative to controls as the complexity
of the maze increased. On a series of span tasks, they did not differ from
controls on letter span, but did significantly worse on word span and sentences
of increasing complexity. These findings indicate a lack of modality specificity
and a failure to initiate organizing strategies as evidenced by inefficiency
in new learning, poor utilization of contextual cues in story and complex
pattern recall, and greater impairment with increasing complexity of the
material.