STEM-COMPLETION PRIMING ALZHEIMERS-DISEASE - THE IMPORTANCE OF TARGETWORD ARTICULATION

Stem-completion priming performance in patients with Alzheimer's type dementia (DAT) was explored in three experiments in which both the sta ndard repetition priming effect and a novel indirect form of priming, cohort priming, were measured. In the first experiment, in which study stimuli were words, both priming effects were found to be markedly at tenuated in the DAT group. In the second experiment, the study stimuli were specially constructed nonwords, and it was found that cohort pri ming was present at normal levels in the DAT group. In a. third experi ment we tested the specific hypothesis that the requirement to overtly articulate target stimuli during the study phase was critical for the appearance of normal cohort priming in the DAT group in Experiment 2, and also for the normal levels of repetition priming which have been reported in some published studies. Two encoding conditions were compa red, one in which subjects simply had to read aloud the target words a nd a second in which subjects were required to make evaluative (pleasa ntness) ratings for each of the target words (identical to that used i n Experiment 1). Stem-completion priming performance following the lat ter condition was significantly attenuated in the DAT group relative t o a healthy control group, but following the ''read aloud'' encoding c ondition, normal levels of repetition and cohort priming were observed . It is suggested that the most fruitful approach to understanding the performance of DAT subjects on lexical repetition priming tasks will involve a detailed analysis of language functions and how they interac t with other, possibly mnemonic, processes in the generation of primed responses.