Extension to One Week of Verbal Memory Consolidation Assessment

• Published in: Neuropsychology 2018-03, Vol.32 (3), p.366-373
• Main Authors: Manoli, Romina, Chartaux-Danjou, Laurence, Mecheri, Halima, Delecroix, Hélène, Noulhiane, Marion, Moroni, Christine
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Cognitive Assessment; Female; Human; Long Term Memory; Male; Memory Consolidation; Verbal Memory
• ISSN: 0894-4105; 1931-1559
• DOI: 10.1037/neu0000403

Objective: Although impairments of long-term recall affect everyday life, they may be missed by standard delayed recall tests, which typically assess the ability to retain new information within a few minutes, without encompassing the consolidation process. We adapted a verbal memory test to evaluate long-term memory consolidation in healthy volunteers. Method: A sample of 238 participants (M = 42.23 years old, SD = 16.45) was administered an adapted version of the French RL/RI-16 (Van der Linden & the members of GREMEM, 2004), the One-Week Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test-word version, in which special feature relies on a 30-min and a 1-week-delayed recall after encoding. We proposed normative data on 4 indicators, depending on participants' own performance during the test, to measure their encoding, storage and consolidation abilities, with a method using an ascendant step-by-step linear regression model and a percentile procedure. Results: Results showed a better performance in women than in men for encoding and cueing scores (p < .01 and p < .05, respectively). We also highlighted an increase of the forgetting score according to the recall delay after encoding (30 min vs. 7 days; Z = 12.49, p < .001), the forgetting percentage 7 days after encoding being largely influenced by participants' age and gender (F[2, 236] = 248.1, p < .001; adjusted R2 = 67%). Conclusions: This study emphasized the role of demographic factors on long-term memory consolidation. The demographically adjusted normative data we provide for the One-Week Free and Cued Selective Reminding Test-word version make it a sensitive tool for long-term memory consolidation assessment in clinical and forensic practice. General Scientific Summary Our study highlighted the interest in evaluating memory performance with greater delay after encoding than it is usually assessed. The normative data provided for our adapted verbal memory test will allow refined memory evaluation in patients with memory impairment. It is crucial to detect such deficit to adapt patients' professional rehabilitation.