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Handbook of neuropsychology, volume 3
Biological
Psychology
30 (1990)
299
299-306
North-Holland
BOOK REVIEWS
F. BOLLER and J. GRAFMAN (eds.), Handbook of Neuropsychology, 3 (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1989) pp. xiv + 501, Dfl.430.
Volume
This is the third volume in a series intended to provide up-to-date and in-depth reviews of both clinical and experimental neuropsychology. The editors wish contributors to cover recent developments in both methodology and theory and expect the series to become an essential reference source for neuroscientists as well as neurologists, psychiatrists and psychologists with more clinical interests. The first two volumes contained an introductory section, and sections on language and related disorders, and disorders of visual behaviour. This volume contains two sections. The first section is edited by Squire and deals with memory and its disorders in 11 chapters. The second section (the sixth in the series) is edited by Gainotti and, in 11 further chapters, covers emotional behaviour and its disorders. The contributors have all done valuable work in the areas they review and can therefore write authoritatively. In general, they have also written clearly on topics that have become numbingly labyrinthine in their implications. The book can therefore be recommended not only for its targeted readership but also for teachers and third-year students following courses in neuropsychology. The section on memory disorders is primarily focused on the amnesias, although it does contain one chapter that describes the non-amnesic kinds of memory disorder that result from frontal lobe lesions. Disorders of short-term memory and of previously well-established semantic memory receive no mention. This is unfortunate and should be remedied in a later volume of the series because work on these topics is fairly intense and thinking about them is continually changing. Much of it has been by European researchers and it would have been more representative to have had at least one non-American among the contributors to this section! Despite this carp, however, I felt the general standard in the section was very high and I would strongly recommend it to anyone who wishes to rapidly gain a state-of-the-art understanding of recent developments in research on amnesia and closely related kinds of memory disturbance. The section begins with a very useful discussion of assessment by Delis, which contains a brief theoretical introduction, the main memory tests that are available, and finishes by adumbrating how a representative set of clinical 0301.0511/90/$3.50
0 1990 - Elsevier Science Publishers
B.V. (North-Holland)
groups would perform on memory tests. This chapter is followed by seven chapters that review the amnesic state, beginning with an excellent general review by Art Shimamura, which considers the main aetiologies of amnesia, the kinds of memory function that are preserved or disproportionately disrupted, and the theoretical interpretations that have been offered for the condition. There is even a short consideration of connectionist models of memory and their relevance to theories of amnesia. The following seven chapters review specific aetiologies associated with organic memory disorders. This includes the effects of frontal lobe lesions on memory for context-related information such as recency and self-ordered pointing (Petrides), memory after temporal lobe surgery (Smith), diencephalic amnesia (Butters and Stuss), amnesia after herpes simplex encephalitis, basal forebrain lesions, Alzheimer’s disease, and anoxia (A.R. Damasio, Tranel and H. Damasio), transient global amnesia (Kritchevsky~, and memory deficits caused by head injury (Levin). These chapters give clear overviews of developments of their respective topics, but I feei the reader would have gained more if there had been a discussant’s chapter that cross-related some of the issues raised by the individual authors. For example, there are a number of unresolved issues concerning retrograde amnesia and these issues are separately considered in several of the chapters. It is uncertain to what extent retrograde amnesia has to be associated with anterograde amnesia, whether the main lesions that cause amnesia are all associated with anterograde amnesia, whether the main lesions that cause amnesia are all associated with similar retrograde amnesias, and whether particularly severe retrograde amnesia only occurs if there has been damage to either or both temporal and frontal association cortex, Patient R.B., described by Zola-Morgan, Squire and their coworkers, had a relatively selective hippocampal lesion associated with anterograde amnesia and what was, at most, a very mild retrograde amnesia and similar claims have sometimes been made for patients with selective diencephalic and basal forebrain lesions. If severe retrograde amnesia, extending back decades into the pre-morbid period, only occurs when there has been temporal and/or frontal association cortex damage, this will have important implications for theories of the amnesias caused by damage to medial temporal lobe limbic structures, basal forebrain and midline diencephalon. The section ends with chapters by Schacter and Kihlstrom on functional amnesia, Glisky and Schacter on memory rehabilitation. and Thai on pharmacological treatment of memory disorders. The first of these is unusual in including discussion of infantile amnesia and sleep-related amnesia as well hysterical and multiple personality as the more obvious post-hypnotic, amnesias. All three chapters are helpful reviews although the last would have benefited from the adscititious inclusion of a section on how good a model of amnesia is found in subjects taking anticholinergic drugs and the benzodiazepines.
Book reviews
301
The second section begins with a useful chapter by Feyereisen on the relationships between theories of emotion and neuropsychological research. This is followed by two further introductory chapters: one on the anatomy of emotion (Mac&i) and one on its neurochemical bases (Pert, Hill and Zipser). Particularly in Mac&i’s chapter, one is struck by the remarkable degree of overlap in the structures involved in memory and in emotion although there is little discussion of the extent to which this is a coincidence or a result of convergent evolutionary pressures. The remaining chapters mainly consider the pathology of emotion, Strauss considers ictal and interictal expressions of emotion, Gainotti discusses the work to which he has made a prominent contribution concerning the different effects of left and right hemisphere lesions on emotion, Etcoff provides an excellent consideration of asymmetries in the recognition of emotion, Pizzamiglio, Caltagirone and Zoccolotti review work on the facial expression of emotion, Heilman and Watson discuss the relationship between arousal and emotion, Davidson and Tomarken contribute a very interesting chapter on the use of electrophysiological techniques in elucidating the lateralization of the systems mediating emotion, Tucker and Liotti provide a remarkably comprehensive review that integrates work on the neuropsychology of anxiety and depression, and Flor-Henry finishes the volume by discussing the recent developments in the work for which he is famous, focusing particularly on the role of left hemisphere dysfunction in schizophrenia, psychopathy, hysteria and obsessional-compulsive disorder. The section does not contain much discussion of limbic system, hypothalamic and thalamic contributions to emotion. This no doubt reflects the relative paucity of relevant work in human subjects. Instead, there is a much greater degree of emphasis on the lateralization of various aspects of emotionality, as one would expect given that Gainotti is the section editor. The issues here are very clearly and thoroughly reviewed although, once again, and as with the section on memory disorders, it would have been helpful to have had a discussant’s chapter that highlighted the main areas of disagreement across the early chapters so as to focus the reader’s mind on the most controversial issues. Although several aspects of emotionality are lateralized, we currently lack the appropriate theoretical knowledge to describe what they are precisely and are still groping toward an explanation of why such lateralization exists. In summary, this is an important book that can unreservedly be recommended to the serious researcher and which should also prove to be a salve for the troubled student or clinician.
Andrew Mayes Department of Psychology, University of Manchester
Psychology
30 (1990)
299
299-306
North-Holland
BOOK REVIEWS
F. BOLLER and J. GRAFMAN (eds.), Handbook of Neuropsychology, 3 (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1989) pp. xiv + 501, Dfl.430.
Volume
This is the third volume in a series intended to provide up-to-date and in-depth reviews of both clinical and experimental neuropsychology. The editors wish contributors to cover recent developments in both methodology and theory and expect the series to become an essential reference source for neuroscientists as well as neurologists, psychiatrists and psychologists with more clinical interests. The first two volumes contained an introductory section, and sections on language and related disorders, and disorders of visual behaviour. This volume contains two sections. The first section is edited by Squire and deals with memory and its disorders in 11 chapters. The second section (the sixth in the series) is edited by Gainotti and, in 11 further chapters, covers emotional behaviour and its disorders. The contributors have all done valuable work in the areas they review and can therefore write authoritatively. In general, they have also written clearly on topics that have become numbingly labyrinthine in their implications. The book can therefore be recommended not only for its targeted readership but also for teachers and third-year students following courses in neuropsychology. The section on memory disorders is primarily focused on the amnesias, although it does contain one chapter that describes the non-amnesic kinds of memory disorder that result from frontal lobe lesions. Disorders of short-term memory and of previously well-established semantic memory receive no mention. This is unfortunate and should be remedied in a later volume of the series because work on these topics is fairly intense and thinking about them is continually changing. Much of it has been by European researchers and it would have been more representative to have had at least one non-American among the contributors to this section! Despite this carp, however, I felt the general standard in the section was very high and I would strongly recommend it to anyone who wishes to rapidly gain a state-of-the-art understanding of recent developments in research on amnesia and closely related kinds of memory disturbance. The section begins with a very useful discussion of assessment by Delis, which contains a brief theoretical introduction, the main memory tests that are available, and finishes by adumbrating how a representative set of clinical 0301.0511/90/$3.50
0 1990 - Elsevier Science Publishers
B.V. (North-Holland)
groups would perform on memory tests. This chapter is followed by seven chapters that review the amnesic state, beginning with an excellent general review by Art Shimamura, which considers the main aetiologies of amnesia, the kinds of memory function that are preserved or disproportionately disrupted, and the theoretical interpretations that have been offered for the condition. There is even a short consideration of connectionist models of memory and their relevance to theories of amnesia. The following seven chapters review specific aetiologies associated with organic memory disorders. This includes the effects of frontal lobe lesions on memory for context-related information such as recency and self-ordered pointing (Petrides), memory after temporal lobe surgery (Smith), diencephalic amnesia (Butters and Stuss), amnesia after herpes simplex encephalitis, basal forebrain lesions, Alzheimer’s disease, and anoxia (A.R. Damasio, Tranel and H. Damasio), transient global amnesia (Kritchevsky~, and memory deficits caused by head injury (Levin). These chapters give clear overviews of developments of their respective topics, but I feei the reader would have gained more if there had been a discussant’s chapter that cross-related some of the issues raised by the individual authors. For example, there are a number of unresolved issues concerning retrograde amnesia and these issues are separately considered in several of the chapters. It is uncertain to what extent retrograde amnesia has to be associated with anterograde amnesia, whether the main lesions that cause amnesia are all associated with anterograde amnesia, whether the main lesions that cause amnesia are all associated with similar retrograde amnesias, and whether particularly severe retrograde amnesia only occurs if there has been damage to either or both temporal and frontal association cortex, Patient R.B., described by Zola-Morgan, Squire and their coworkers, had a relatively selective hippocampal lesion associated with anterograde amnesia and what was, at most, a very mild retrograde amnesia and similar claims have sometimes been made for patients with selective diencephalic and basal forebrain lesions. If severe retrograde amnesia, extending back decades into the pre-morbid period, only occurs when there has been temporal and/or frontal association cortex damage, this will have important implications for theories of the amnesias caused by damage to medial temporal lobe limbic structures, basal forebrain and midline diencephalon. The section ends with chapters by Schacter and Kihlstrom on functional amnesia, Glisky and Schacter on memory rehabilitation. and Thai on pharmacological treatment of memory disorders. The first of these is unusual in including discussion of infantile amnesia and sleep-related amnesia as well hysterical and multiple personality as the more obvious post-hypnotic, amnesias. All three chapters are helpful reviews although the last would have benefited from the adscititious inclusion of a section on how good a model of amnesia is found in subjects taking anticholinergic drugs and the benzodiazepines.
Book reviews
301
The second section begins with a useful chapter by Feyereisen on the relationships between theories of emotion and neuropsychological research. This is followed by two further introductory chapters: one on the anatomy of emotion (Mac&i) and one on its neurochemical bases (Pert, Hill and Zipser). Particularly in Mac&i’s chapter, one is struck by the remarkable degree of overlap in the structures involved in memory and in emotion although there is little discussion of the extent to which this is a coincidence or a result of convergent evolutionary pressures. The remaining chapters mainly consider the pathology of emotion, Strauss considers ictal and interictal expressions of emotion, Gainotti discusses the work to which he has made a prominent contribution concerning the different effects of left and right hemisphere lesions on emotion, Etcoff provides an excellent consideration of asymmetries in the recognition of emotion, Pizzamiglio, Caltagirone and Zoccolotti review work on the facial expression of emotion, Heilman and Watson discuss the relationship between arousal and emotion, Davidson and Tomarken contribute a very interesting chapter on the use of electrophysiological techniques in elucidating the lateralization of the systems mediating emotion, Tucker and Liotti provide a remarkably comprehensive review that integrates work on the neuropsychology of anxiety and depression, and Flor-Henry finishes the volume by discussing the recent developments in the work for which he is famous, focusing particularly on the role of left hemisphere dysfunction in schizophrenia, psychopathy, hysteria and obsessional-compulsive disorder. The section does not contain much discussion of limbic system, hypothalamic and thalamic contributions to emotion. This no doubt reflects the relative paucity of relevant work in human subjects. Instead, there is a much greater degree of emphasis on the lateralization of various aspects of emotionality, as one would expect given that Gainotti is the section editor. The issues here are very clearly and thoroughly reviewed although, once again, and as with the section on memory disorders, it would have been helpful to have had a discussant’s chapter that highlighted the main areas of disagreement across the early chapters so as to focus the reader’s mind on the most controversial issues. Although several aspects of emotionality are lateralized, we currently lack the appropriate theoretical knowledge to describe what they are precisely and are still groping toward an explanation of why such lateralization exists. In summary, this is an important book that can unreservedly be recommended to the serious researcher and which should also prove to be a salve for the troubled student or clinician.
Andrew Mayes Department of Psychology, University of Manchester