Memory Deficits in Parkinson’s Disease

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to investigate deficits in recognition, recall, and prospective memory among Parkinson’s disease (PD) patients, and to ascertain whether task difficulty and disease severity moderate these deficits. Comparisons were made between 41 nondemented PD participants, divided into early-stage and advanced-stage groups, and 41 matched controls. PD participants exhibited deficits in recognition, recall, and prospective memory. The advanced-stage PD group produced greater deficits than the early-stage PD group in all tasks, suggesting that these deficits increase in step with overall disease severity. The results of the task difficulty manipulation provide a partial explanation for the inconsistencies in the literature concerning the existence of recognition memory deficits in PD. This research was supported by the Massey University Research Fund Grant 1-0575-67302A, the Massey University Research Equipment Fund Grant 1–0575–98025, and the School of Psychology at Massey University. Parts of this article were presented in 2000 at the annual conference of the British Psychological Society, Winchester, England.