Remote spatial memory in an amnesic person with extensive bilateral hippocampal lesions

R. Shayna Rosenbaum, Sandra Priselac, Stefan Köhler, Sandra E. Black, Fuqiang Gao, Lynn Nadel, Morris Moscovitch
2000 Nature Neuroscience  
Remote spatial memory was investigated in KC., a patient with extensive bilateral hippocampal lesions. Despite his severe amnesia for autobiographical knowledge, E C . performed nomally on a wide range of spatial tests of his neighbourhood and the world which included: 1. naturai navigation in his wighbourhood, 2. sketch mapphg, 3. verbal mapping, 4. vector mapping, 5. blocked-route problem-solving, 6. distance judgments, 7. proximity judgments, 8. sequencing landmarks dong routes, and 9.
more » ... ng gross features on world maps (Le., continents, coutries, oceaos). He was severely impaire4 however, in refognkbg and identi-g al1 but the most salient neighbourhood landmarks and Iocating specific features on world maps (Le., cities). The results suggest th& the hippocampus does not appear critical for the maintenauce and retrieval of remotely-formed cognitive maps but may be necessary for specifjing details of different locations within a map. This deficit may be similar to K.C.'s episodic memory deficit where he remembers remote general knowledge but not specific autobiographical details.
doi:10.1038/79867 pmid:11017178 fatcat:o7qietdnzrgdbc7i4q5igetndq