ERIC Number: EJ830288
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2009-Apr
Pages: 7
Abstractor: As Provided
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0278-2626
EISSN: N/A
Lateralization of Egocentric and Allocentric Spatial Processing after Parietal Brain Lesions
Iachini, Tina; Ruggiero, Gennaro; Conson, Massimiliano; Trojano, Luigi
Brain and Cognition, v69 n3 p514-520 Apr 2009
The purpose of this paper was to verify whether left and right parietal brain lesions may selectively impair egocentric and allocentric processing of spatial information in near/far spaces. Two Right-Brain-Damaged (RBD), 2 Left-Brain-Damaged (LBD) patients (not affected by neglect or language disturbances) and eight normal controls were submitted to the Ego-Allo Task requiring distance judgments computed according to egocentric or allocentric frames of reference in near/far spaces. Subjects also completed a general neuropsychological assessment and the following visuospatial tasks: reproduction of the Rey-Osterreith figure, line length judgement, point position identification, mental rotation, mental construction, line length memory, line length inference, Corsi block-tapping task. LBD patients presented difficulties in both egocentric and allocentric processing, whereas RBD patients dropped in egocentric but not in allocentric judgements, and in near but not far space. Further, RBD patients dropped in perceptually comparing linear distances, whereas LBD patients failed in memory for distances. The overall pattern of results suggests that the right hemisphere is specialized in processing metric information according to egocentric frames of reference. The data are interpreted according to a theoretical model that highlights the close link between egocentric processing and perceptual control of action. (Contains 1 table and 2 figures.)
Descriptors: Spatial Ability, Neurological Impairments, Brain Hemisphere Functions, Patients, Memory
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Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Research
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A