LONG-LASTING INDIRECT MEMORY PERFORMANCE FOR ABSTRACT SHAPES IN AMNESICS AND MATCHED CONTROLS

The speed with which subjects copied complex geometrical shapes was us ed as an indirect memory measure in a group of 12 organic amnesics of several aetiologies and their matched controls, tested at two delays. Both subject groups were found to copy previously seen shapes faster t han new foil shapes, and the magnitude of the speed up effect did not differ significantly between amnesics and matched controls when tested at two delays of 10 min and 24 hr, respectively. The size of the indi rect memory effect did not decline across the delay in either group. I n contrast to indirect memory performance, direct memory performance, measured by two-choice recognition of the shapes, was impaired in the amnesic group and there was some suggestion that recognition performan ce declined across the delay in both subject groups.