Neuropsychological Study On Attention Cognition

Objective To estimate the influence of aging on the attention networks in Chinese younger middle-aged and older adults and investigate the characteristics of attention networks impairment in Parkinson's disease patients in study 1. To investigate and compare the effect of inhibition of return in vision and hearing and explore possible mechanisms in study 2.Methods We used the attention network test to examine three groups of younger, middle-aged, and older participants on the efficiency of three anatomically defined attentional networks: alerting, orienting, and executive control and compare PD with normal controls on the efficiency of three attentional networks in study 1. In study 2 two experiments on inhibition of return were studied with college students as the subjects using cue-target method. Visual stimuli were used in the first experiment and auditory ones in the second. The stimulus onset asynchrony between cue and target was systematically varied from 150, 300, 500, 700,1000ms.Results There is a clear age effect on the executive network, related to the resolution of conflict, and a smaller influence on the alerting network for responding efficiently to warning signals. No evidence of abnormality was found in the orienting network. The correct rate of attention network test was significantly lower (P < 0.05) in PD patients...