The Julian Assange case and its implications for expert witness evidence.

The recent Julian Assange case raised a number of important issues regarding the role of expert witnesses in court. While written from a personal perspective, this paper will suggest that these issues need much fuller discussion than they have received to date. They will be discussed in the context of what actually happened in this case, the details of which were reported only sketchily (and sometimes inaccurately) in the press.

Prefrontally mediated inhibition of memory systems in dissociative amnesia.

Background: The mechanisms underlying generalized forms of dissociative ('psychogenic') amnesia are poorly understood. One theory suggests that memory retrieval is inhibited via prefrontal control. Findings from cognitive neuroscience offer a candidate mechanism for this proposed retrieval inhibition.

Observations on the Clinical Features of the Wernicke-Korsakoff Syndrome.

This paper begins with a short case report of florid, spontaneous confabulation in a 61-year-old man with an alcohol-induced Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome. His confabulation extended across episodic and personal semantic memory, as well as orientation in time and place, as measured on Dalla Barba's Confabulation Battery. Five other brief case summaries will then be presented, followed by a summary of the clinical, neurological, and background neuropsychological findings in three earlier series of Korsakoff patients.

What is the Korsakoff syndrome? - a paper in tribute to Prof Alwyn Lishman.

Introduction: Alwyn Lishman was interested in how memory research could be applied to clinical psychiatry. After a brief review of his major contributions, this paper will focus on his research on the alcoholic Korsakoff syndrome. It will consider how his findings relate to contemporary debates, particularly on how the syndrome should be defined, and its relationship to broader alcohol-induced cognitive impairments.

Autobiographical memory loss in Alzheimer's disease: The role of the reminiscence bump.

Research on autobiographical memory loss in Alzheimer's disease (AD) is characterized by conflicting findings concerning a possible sparing of older memories. The literature shows evidence for both a negative temporal gradient, a flat gradient and a reminiscence bump - that is, a disproportionally high frequency of memories from early adulthood relative to surrounding periods. Here, we expanded the number of lifetime periods of the Autobiographical Memory Interview (AMI; Kopelman, Wilson & Baddeley, 1989, 1990) from the standard three to seven in order to increase the sensitivity of the test to variations in the temporal distribution of autobiographical memories across the life span.

Accelerated forgetting in temporal lobe epilepsy: When does it occur?

Objective: The main goal of the study was to analyse differences in the forgetting rates of Temporal Lobe Epilepsy (TLE) patients at different intervals (30 sec, 10 min, 1 day and 1 week) compared with those of healthy controls. A secondary aim of this research was to provide an assessment of the relationship between clinical epilepsy-related variables and forgetting rates in TLE patients.

Method: The sample was composed of 14 TLE patients and 14 healthy matched controls.

A prospective study of the cognitive and psychiatric effects of pituitary tumours and their treatments.

Neurocognitive complaints are common in patients with pituitary tumours, particularly in memory and concentration. Past studies have shown impairments in executive function and memory, but it is not clear whether these result from direct effects of the tumour (pressure or hormonal secretion), incidental damage from radiotherapy or surgical treatments, and/or mediating psychiatric factors. This study assessed cognitive function and psychiatric state of 86 pituitary tumour patients and 18 healthy controls, pre and post-treatment, to examine the effects of tumour aetiology and treatment type.

Factors associated with self- and informant ratings of quality of life, well-being and life satisfaction in people with mild-to-moderate dementia: results from the Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life programme.

Background: a large number of studies have explored factors related to self- and informant ratings of quality of life in people with dementia, but many studies have had relatively small sample sizes and mainly focused on health conditions and dementia symptoms. The aim of this study is to compare self- and informant-rated quality of life, life satisfaction and well-being, and investigate the relationships of the two different rating methods with various social, psychological and health factors, using a large cohort study of community-dwelling people with dementia and carers in Great Britain.

Methods: this study included 1,283 dyads of people with mild-to-moderate dementia and their primary carers in the Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life study.

Use and costs of services and unpaid care for people with mild-to-moderate dementia: Baseline results from the IDEAL cohort study.

Introduction: We examined 3-month service use and costs of care for people with mild-to-moderate dementia in Great Britain.

Methods: We analyzed Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life cohort study baseline data on paid care, out-of-pocket expenditure, and unpaid care from participants with dementia (N = 1547) and their carers (N = 1283). In regression analyses, we estimated per-group mean costs of diagnostic and sociodemographic subgroups.

Anomalies of Autobiographical Memory.

Objectives: In this paper, I review three 'anomalies' or disorders in autobiographical memory: neurological retrograde amnesia (RA), spontaneous confabulation, and psychogenic amnesia.

Methods: Existing theories are reviewed, their limitations considered, some of my own empirical findings briefly described, and possible interpretations proposed and interspersed with illustrative case-reports.

Results: In RA, there may be an important retrieval component to the deficit, and factors at encoding may give rise to the relative preservation of early memories (and the reminiscence bump) which manifests as a temporal gradient.

Clinical and neuroimaging correlates of cognition in HIV.

This study investigated whether HIV-positive participants, stable on combined antiretroviral therapy (cART), showed cognitive impairments relative to HIV-negative controls; and whether clinical and neuroimaging factors correlated with cognitive function in the HIV-positive participants. One hundred and twenty-six white men who have sex with men, of whom 78 were HIV-positive and stable on cART and 48 were HIV negative, were recruited to this cross-sectional study. The median age of HIV-positive participants in this study was 47.

Psychological predictors of 'living well' with dementia: findings from the IDEAL study.

Increasingly, research has explored how psychological resources enable adaptation to illness. However, it is unclear whether psychological resources protect against the potential negative effects on living well with a progressive and life-limiting condition such as dementia. This paper examines the association between psychological resources and the ability to 'live well' with dementia.

A Comprehensive Model of Factors Associated With Subjective Perceptions of "Living Well" With Dementia: Findings From the IDEAL Study.

Introduction: We aimed to better understand what predicts the capability to "live well" with dementia by identifying the relative contribution of life domains associated with the subjective experience of living well.

Methods: We analyzed data from 1547 individuals with mild-to-moderate dementia in the IDEAL cohort. We generated a "living well" latent factor from measures of quality of life, satisfaction with life, and well-being.

A Comprehensive Model of Factors Associated With Capability to "Live Well" for Family Caregivers of People Living With Mild-to-Moderate Dementia: Findings From the IDEAL Study.

Introduction: Understanding key influences on outcomes for caregivers of people with dementia is hampered by inconsistent conceptualization and measurement of outcomes and limited evidence about the relative impact of different variables. We aimed to address these issues.

Methods: We analyzed data from 1283 caregivers of community-dwelling individuals with mild-to-moderate dementia in the Improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life cohort study.

The impact of co-morbidity on the quality of life of people with dementia: findings from the IDEAL study.

Background: The aim was to investigate the co-morbidity profile of people with dementia and examine the associations between severity of co-morbidity, health-related quality of life (HRQoL) and quality of life (QoL).

Methods: The improving the experience of Dementia and Enhancing Active Life (IDEAL) cohort consisted of 1,547 people diagnosed with dementia who provided information on the number and type of co-morbid conditions. Participants also provided ratings of their health-related and dementia-specific QoL.

Have we forgotten about forgetting? A critical review of 'accelerated long-term forgetting' in temporal lobe epilepsy.

Forgetting has been researched for over a century. This literature highlighted how forgetting rates can vary dependent on factors in the design and method. Recent interest in forgetting revived with evidence suggesting that seizures experienced almost immediately after matched learning could accelerate forgetting.

Long-term forgetting in temporal lobe epilepsy: Is this phenomenon a norm?

Objectives: This research investigated forgetting rates of patients with temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) at brief and longer intervals.

Methods: The sample is formed by 5 patients with TLE and 10 healthy individuals. One of the patients received the diagnosis of transient epileptic amnesia (TEA).

Psychogenic amnesia: syndromes, outcome, and patterns of retrograde amnesia.

There are very few case series of patients with acute psychogenic memory loss (also known as dissociative/functional amnesia), and still fewer studies of outcome, or comparisons with neurological memory-disordered patients. Consequently, the literature on psychogenic amnesia is somewhat fragmented and offers little prognostic value for individual patients. In the present study, we reviewed the case records and neuropsychological findings in 53 psychogenic amnesia cases (ratio of 3:1, males:females), in comparison with 21 consecutively recruited neurological memory-disordered patients and 14 healthy control subjects.

Spatial navigation deficits in amnestic mild cognitive impairment with neuropsychiatric comorbidity.

Aims: To find out whether neuropsychiatric comorbidity (comMCI) influences spatial navigation performance in amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI).

Methods: We recruited aMCI patients with (n = 21) and without (n = 21) neuropsychiatric comorbidity or alcohol abuse, matched for global cognitive impairment and cognitively healthy elderly participants (HE, n = 22). They completed the Mini-Mental State Examination and a virtual Hidden Goal Task in egocentric, allocentric, and delayed recall subtests.

Material Specificity Drives Medial Temporal Lobe Familiarity But Not Hippocampal Recollection.

The specific role of the perirhinal (PRC), entorhinal (ERC) and parahippocampal cortices (PHC) in supporting familiarity-based recognition remains unknown. An fMRI study explored whether these medial temporal lobe (MTL) structures responded in the same way or differentially to familiarity as a function of stimulus type at recognition. A secondary aim was to explore whether the hippocampus responds in the same way to equally strong familiarity and recollection and whether this is influenced by the kind of stimulus involved.