NEUROCOGNITIVE IMPAIRMENTS ASSOCIATED WITH AMBIGUOUS HANDEDNESS IN THE CHRONICALLY MENTALLY-ILL

One form of atypical handedness, ambiguous handedness, is found in rou ghly one-quarter of chronic schizophrenic patients. Despite its preval ence, relatively little is known about the neurccognitive underpinning s of ambiguous handedness. In the present study we examined the perfor mance of ambiguous (n = 19) and non-ambiguous (n = 39) handed chronica lly mentally ill inpatients on selected measures of verbal learning, m otor learning and manual dexterity. The results revealed that ambiguou s handers were more impaired than non-ambiguous handers in verbal lear ning, but not motor learning. Group differences in manual dexterity we re significant for the entire sample, but not when analyses were limit ed to males. These findings suggest that impairments in verbal learnin g may be linked to the pathogenesis of ambiguous handedness in chronic psychiatric patients. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ireland Ltd.