Word frequency and word stem completion in Korsakoff patients

Korsakoff patients are generally agreed to be impaired in conscious recolle ction, but whether their implicit memory performance is also affected is le ss certain. A deficit in novelty dependent encoding (i.e., elaboration lear ning) could account for both types of impairments and predicts a reduced im plicit word frequency effect in the patients. This effect was examined with word stem completion in nineteen Korsakoff patients and nineteen healthy c ontrols. The word frequency effect was larger in controls than in patients in absolute terms, but not reliably so. It is concluded that elaboration le arning may be spared to some degree in Korsakoff amnesia, but, in line with the original reasoning by Rorsakoff (1889/1996), it may only be engaged by the patients when they are continuously prompted to do so.