Focal retrograde amnesia and the attribution of causality: An exceptionally benign commentary

Kopelman offers an invaluable and comprehensive review of empirical and the oretical issues relating to focal retrograde amnesia and related conditions . He makes two main points: (1) That many of the published cases of focal r etrograde amnesia in fact showed significant anterograde memory impairment, and thus should strictly not be classified as cases of focal retrograde am nesia; (2) that there are hazards in attributing causality in patients with retrograde amnesia, especially those with a major autobiographical compone nt. In the case of his first point, I suggest that his observations are a m atter of interpretation, essentially revolving around the defining criteria for the selection of memories to be compared and for regarding one set of memories as "disproportionately impaired" compared to the other. With regar d to the second point, however, I largely concur with his observations, add ing some reservations of my own. I conclude that although some patients wit h focal retrograde amnesia may represent a diagnostic dilemma when it comes to attributing causality, those who are shown to have a clear neural basis to their memory loss provide an avenue for exploring the brain's plasticit y in accommodating the formation of new memories despite the loss of equiva lent old memories.