Normalization of horizontal pseudoneglect following right, but not left, upper limb amputation

Subjects who have suffered limb amputations are known to have physiological alterations of their body's representation, or schema. Such changes of brain function might alter the right–left spatial allocation of attention. The goal of this study was to learn if, compared to normal subjects, limb...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Neuropsychologia 2009-03, Vol.47 (4), p.1204-1207
Main Authors: Kline, Julia E., Clark, Abigail M., Chan, Brenda L., McAuliffe, Caitlin L., Heilman, Kenneth M., Tsao, Jack W.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Adolescent
Adult
Adult and adolescent clinical studies
Amputation
Amputation - adverse effects
Amputation, Traumatic - etiology
Amputation, Traumatic - psychology
Analysis of Variance
Arm Injuries - surgery
Attention - physiology
Biological and medical sciences
Functional Laterality
Humans
Line bisection
Male
Medical sciences
Middle Aged
Neuropsychological Tests
Organic mental disorders. Neuropsychology
Perceptual Masking
Pseudoneglect
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
Psychomotor Performance - physiology
Psychopathology. Psychiatry
Space Perception - physiology
Young Adult
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Summary:Subjects who have suffered limb amputations are known to have physiological alterations of their body's representation, or schema. Such changes of brain function might alter the right–left spatial allocation of attention. The goal of this study was to learn if, compared to normal subjects, limb amputees had alterations of right–left spatial attention. The subjects were veterans with amputation of one upper or lower limb. All subjects performed horizontal line bisections in their left, middle and right body-centered space. Following right upper limb amputation, there appears to be a reduction of the normal left-sided bias (pseudoneglect) primarily for lines presented in the right body hemispace. This amputation-induced alteration of attentional bias might be related to changes in the body schema, a compensatory strategy, or alterations of scanning patterns. Further studies are needed to reproduce these results and to learn the underlying brain mechanism.
ISSN:0028-3932
1873-3514
DOI:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2009.01.005