SPATIAL LOCATIONS GONE AWRY - OBJECT AND SPATIAL MEMORY DEFICITS IN CHILDREN WITH FETAL ALCOHOL SYNDROME

Hippocampus vulnerability following gestational alcohol exposure has b een demonstrated neuroanatomically and behaviorally in animal models o f fetal alcohol syndrome (FAS). There have been no similar demonstrati ons in humans. The Smith and Milner (1981) Memory for 16 Objects task has been used to explore the effects of right vs left temporal lobecto my with varying degrees of damage to the hippocampus. In the present e xperiment, this same task was administered to 15 children with FAS (me an age 10.03, S.D. = 2.33) and 15 control children (mean age 10.02, S. D. = 2.31). Similar to patients with right temporal lobectomies and a large excision to the hippocampus, children with FAS were able to perf orm immediate but not delayed object recall, had a general spatial mem ory deficit (P < 0.05), and significantly distorted the spatial array (P < 0.05). Although these results are consistent with an interpretati on of hippocampal dysfunction, gestational alcohol exposure is known t o result in a wide-ranging spectrum of neuropsychological deficits tha t vary in both extent and severity. Visuospatial deficits on the Beery test of Visuomotor Integration and Clock Drawing are suggestive of th e other neural regions that may be involved in producing the behaviora l deficits in children with FAS.