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Working memory and relational reasoning in Klinefelter syndrome

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 August 2003

Christina L. Fales ,
Barbara J. Knowlton ,
Keith J. Holyoak ,
Daniel H. Geschwind ,
Ronald S. Swerdloff  and
Irene Gaw Gonzalo
Christina L. Fales*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, California
Barbara J. Knowlton
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, California
Keith J. Holyoak
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles, California
Daniel H. Geschwind
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, University of California, Los Angeles, California
Ronald S. Swerdloff
Affiliation:
Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, Torrance, California
Irene Gaw Gonzalo
Affiliation:
Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, Torrance, California
*
Reprint requests to: Christina L. Fales, Department of Psychology, University of California—Los Angeles, 405 Hilgard Avenue, Los Angeles, CA 90095-1563. E-mail: fales@psych.ucla.edu
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Abstract

Klinefelter syndrome (KS) is a sex chromosome abnormality associated with male infertility and mild cognitive deficits. Individuals with KS have been reported to have impaired verbal ability, as well as deficits in executive function. To further understand the nature of their deficits, we assessed specific elements of frontal lobe function such as working memory and relational reasoning. Men with KS exhibited a deficit in a transitive inference task in which participants ordered a set of names based on a list of propositions about the relative heights of the people named. This deficit was present even for items in which the propositions were given in order, so a chaining strategy could be used. Men with KS are also impaired on the n-back task, which uses letters as stimuli. In contrast, these men performed as well as controls in nonverbal reasoning (Raven's Progressive Matrices). These results suggest that men with KS have intact nonverbal reasoning abilities, but that a difficulty in encoding verbal information into working memory may underlie their executive and linguistic impairments. (JINS, 2003, 9, 839–846.)

Keywords

Klinefelter syndromeExecutive functionSex chromosome abnormalityWorking memoryRelational reasoningComplexity
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society , Volume 9 , Issue 6 , September 2003 , pp. 839 - 846
Copyright
Copyright © The International Neuropsychological Society 2003

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