Abstract:

Studied whether Korsakoff patients' deficits in cognitive estimation and affective judgments are associated, assuming that they result from a deterioration of common underlying processes. A sample of 39 patients with alcoholic Korsakoff syndrome (mean age 57 years) as well as 39 healthy control subjects (mean age 60 years) completed a neuropsychological test battery, assessing general cognitive state, intelligence, information-processing speed, memory, and executive functions. A newly developed German affective judgment task, the Affektiver Woertertest (AWT), tested the judgment of negative, neutral, and positive words. Cognitive estimation on the dimensions size, weight, quantity, and time was assessed with the German Test zum kognitiven Schaetzen (TKS). Compared to controls, patients showed marked deficits in both cognitive estimation and affective judgment. In addition to being highly intercorrelated, these deficits were also associated with basic and higher cognitive functions. A common basis for the deficits in cognitive estimation and affective judgment in Korsakoff syndrome is assumed from the results.