The goal of this project is to use pictures to better understand the specific nature of memory loss in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD). By using techniques of experimental psychology and cognitive neuroscience, this work will help to elucidate which processes of recognition memory are impaired and which are relatively intact. Behavioral data will inform us about the patients' performance, and event-related potentials (ERPs) will allow us to record discrete changes in brain activity, without the necessity of overt behavioral responses from study participants. Dual-process models of memory argue that recognition is subserved by recollection and familiarity. While it is understood that recollection is impaired early in AD, research is conflicted as to whether patients with mild AD can successfully use familiarity to support memory judgments. Our previous work suggests that pictures are an important class of stimuli that may allow patients with mild AD to use enhanced familiarity to improve their memory accuracy over words. Based on this hypothesis, the primary aims of the proposed research are to determine 1) whether pictures allow patients with mild AD to successfully use familiarity to support picture recognition, 2) whether pictures allow patients with mild AD to successfully use post-retrieval monitoring and verification, and 3) whether patients with mild AD can use imagery strategies to turn words into pictures. As part of this proposed research, the candidate seeks training in: 1) the methodology and ethics of clinical research pertaining to patients, 2) advanced cognitive neuroscience of learning and memory and 3) understanding complex high-density ERP data and how it relates to cognitive and neural correlates of memory. The proposed research plan, didactic courses, and tutorial instruction from mentors and advisors will foster the candidate's development into an independent clinician-scientist focusing on understanding how memory breaks down in Alzheimer's disease.
The experiments outlined in this proposal are aimed both at understanding the underpinnings of memory loss in AD, and also at possible early intervention strategies that can be rapidly implemented in the clinical setting. This translational research can help to ease the burden placed on caregivers in the home, ease the financial burden placed on the infrastructure of the health care system, and provide a novel understanding of this devastating disease to allow for new drug therapies and interventions to be developed.
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