The hippocampus and delayed recall: Bigger is not necessarily better?

Healthy young female participants were tested on a measure of delayed verba l recall and then received volumetric Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scan s. The analysis of the MRI scans focused on the volume of the hippocampus. Left hippocampal volume was negatively associated with the level of delayed verbal recall performance. This relationship was confirmed in further test ing. This finding is consistent with a previous report of a similar relatio nship in healthy elderly individuals, but not in patients with Alzheimer's disease, in whom the opposite relationship was observed. An explanation of these findings in terms of impaired neural pruning of the hippocampus is ad vanced, whereby insufficient pruning of the hippocampus during childhood an d adolescence (following adequate growth) may lead to reduced mnemonic effi ciency.