Verbal and Spatial Working Memory Capacity in Blind Adults and the Possible Influence of Age at Blindness Onset: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.
Marta Sepúlveda-Palomo, David Del Río, Dolores Villalobos, Santiago Fernández González
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引用次数: 0
Abstract
The loss of a sense, such as vision, forces individuals to adapt to their environment and its demands in a variety of ways. In the case of blindness, significant neurofunctional and cognitive changes have been documented. However, there is no clear consensus on the differences in performance between adult blind participants and sighted controls in cognitive processes such as working memory (WM). Two variables are important, including the cognitive task used to measure working memory and the age at which vision loss occurs. This review is aimed at exploring potential disparities in verbal and spatial WM performance between blind and sighted adults, as well as understanding how these differences may be influenced by the age of vision loss. A systematic search across PsycArticles, PsycInfo, Medline, and Web of Science databases identified 21 pertinent studies. The studies were categorized, and effect sizes were calculated through meta-analysis, distinguishing between verbal (auditory simple forward and backward span, complex span, and n-back) and visuospatial WM tasks (adapted Corsi-block and simple storage tasks, imagery tasks, and complex storage tasks). Visual sensory loss induces adaptations affecting WM function in blind participants. In the verbal domain, improved phonological processing and/or serial item position encoding might facilitate WM retrieval. In contrast, in spatial WM, an over-reliance on serial processing may hinder strategic grouping in blind individuals. This review highlights the need to further explore the role of age at the time of vision loss. Although evidence suggests that adaptations to serial processing may be more pronounced in early development, particularly in comparison to those who become blind in adulthood, the available data are limited. The study calls for further research to deepen our understanding of cognitive adaptations and their temporal dynamics in response to vision loss.
期刊介绍:
Neuropsychology Review is a quarterly, refereed publication devoted to integrative review papers on substantive content areas in neuropsychology, with particular focus on populations with endogenous or acquired conditions affecting brain and function and on translational research providing a mechanistic understanding of clinical problems. Publication of new data is not the purview of the journal. Articles are written by international specialists in the field, discussing such complex issues as distinctive functional features of central nervous system disease and injury; challenges in early diagnosis; the impact of genes and environment on function; risk factors for functional impairment; treatment efficacy of neuropsychological rehabilitation; the role of neuroimaging, neuroelectrophysiology, and other neurometric modalities in explicating function; clinical trial design; neuropsychological function and its substrates characteristic of normal development and aging; and neuropsychological dysfunction and its substrates in neurological, psychiatric, and medical conditions. The journal''s broad perspective is supported by an outstanding, multidisciplinary editorial review board guided by the aim to provide students and professionals, clinicians and researchers with scholarly articles that critically and objectively summarize and synthesize the strengths and weaknesses in the literature and propose novel hypotheses, methods of analysis, and links to other fields.