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Abstract:
Neuropsychological and neuroimaging studies of prospective
memory, which is memory for future intentions, have increased in
recent years. In the present neuropsychological study, eight
patients with orbitofrontal lesion, thirty young and thirty
middle-aged healthy control subjects were participated. We used a
new mini-day task to know how the orbitofrontal cortex contributes
to prospective remembering. In this task, participants were first
asked to memorize twelve sets of simple daily action with time
(e.g., ``I will buy a magazine at the station stand at eight in the
morning.''), preparing for the following test phase. They were then
instructed to start a virtual high-speed clock and to stop it to
report the contents of the actions when the appropriate time would
come. Results indicated that two types of distinctive behavioral
responses were found in the patients group, that is, 1) lack of
being punctual in stopping clock with delayed reports of previously
learned contents, and 2) inappropriate stopping of clock with
imagined and/or stereotyped incorrect reports of contents. These
findings suggest that the orbitofrontal cortex is one of the
crucial components in prospective remembering.
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