Biomedical subjects

Yana Suchy

Publications and source records attributed to Yana Suchy.

7 recordsLinked to original sources

PubMed2006

Forming, switching, and maintaining mental sets among psychopathic offenders during verbal and nonverbal tasks: another look at the left-hemisphere activation hypothesis.

Three hypotheses for cognitive deficits among psychopaths were tested: executive dysfunction, left hemisphere activation, and an interaction between the two. Twenty-one psychopathic and 23 nonpsychopathic criminal offenders identified with the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised participated in verbal and visual-spatial tasks during which the level of executive processing demands was manipulated. Consistent with prior research, psychopathic offenders made more errors than controls, but only during the verbal task and only on trials with high executive demand. Within those trials, most errors occurred when set-maintenance demands were the highest. No response latency differences between groups were found.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2005

State-dependent executive deficits among psychopathic offenders.

Three hypotheses for cognitive deficits among psychopaths were tested: Response modulation, left hemisphere activation, and an interaction between the 2. Twenty-six psychopathic and 32 nonpsychopathic criminal offenders identified with the Hare Psychopathy Checklist-Revised were randomly assigned to left- and right-hemisphere activation groups. An auditory processing task was administered, such that the ability to classify nonverbal auditory signals and the ability to manage subgoals were assessed under left- and right-hemisphere activation conditions. The results showed that psychopaths' information processing in general, including response modulation, was deleteriously affected by left-hemisphere activation, supporting 2 of the 3 hypotheses tested. These results offer an explanation for inconsistent findings of executive deficits among psychopaths.

Adult↗

PubMed2005

Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale-Electronic Version: first examination of reliability, validity, and incremental utility.

Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale (BDS) is a clinical measure previously shown to be related to frontal lobe integrity, executive abilities, and functional independence. Electronic version of the scale (BDS-EV) was developed and its reliability and validity were examined. The BDS-EV, the original BDS, and a brief battery of traditional clinical tests were administered to 55 community-dwelling adults ages 18 to 68. The results yielded high internal consistency and provided support for convergent, discriminant, and incremental validity. Overall, the results demonstrate the feasibility of converting the BDS into an electronic instrument and support continued research and development of this instrument.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2003

Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale deficits among traumatic brain injury patients, part I: Validation with nongeriatric patients.

The Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale is a measure of executive abilities initially designed to predict functional independence in geriatric populations. The current study examined the utility of two Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale (BDS) scoring systems in a nongeriatric sample. The BDS was administered to 49 TBI patients undergoing inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation. The results demonstrate slightly greater utility of the BDS-II scoring system, and support clinical utility of the instrument with nongeriatric patients. Specifically, the Motor Programming Factor and Environmental Independence Factor were more impaired among patients with severe, as compared to mild to moderate, TBIs. In contrast, the Fluid Intelligence Factor was more impaired among patients with frontal, as compared to nonfrontal, injuries. However, when patients were categorized by severity, lesion location differences on the BDS total score and factors were found only for patients with mild to moderate injuries. Similarly, when patients were categorized by lesion location, severity effects were only present among the nonfrontal group. Receiver Operating Characteristic curves demonstrated sensitivity and specificity rates that ranged from 60% to 100% for clinically meaningful cutting scores.

Activities of Daily Living↗

PubMed2003

Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale deficits among traumatic brain injury patients, part II: Comparison to other measures of executive functioning.

The clinical utility of the Behavioral Dyscontrol Scale (BDS) was compared to that of verbal fluency, the Trail Making Test, and the Stroop Color-Word Test, as well as measures of processing speed/cognitive efficiency and manual dexterity. The ability of these measures to classify 49 TBI patients into frontal versus nonfrontal and mild to moderate versus severe groups was examined. The results showed that the Fluid Intelligence Factor of the BDS improved classifications above and beyond traditional executive measures, but was particularly successful at classifying patients who sustained mild injuries. In contrast, traditional executive instruments were successful at lesion location classifications only among the patients with severe injuries. Severity classifications were successful both for traditional measures of processing speed/cognitive efficiency and for the Motor Programming Factor of the BDS, but only among patients with nonfrontal injuries. These results demonstrate that severity of injury may be an important moderator of tests' sensitivity to frontal lobe involvement.

Adult↗

PubMed2003

Verbal and nonverbal fluency performance before and after seizure surgery.

The utility of verbal (FAS) and nonverbal (Ruff Figural Fluency Test: RFFT) fluency tests for detecting deficits associated with focal seizures and surgical interventions was examined. The patients were 174 adults with intractable epilepsy who underwent epilepsy surgery: 152 temporal lobectomies and 22 frontal lobectomies. The results of the study suggest that the RFFT is somewhat superior to FAS in its ability to discriminate between frontal and temporal seizure foci, and is a useful component of preoperative neuropsychological batteries. Conversely, FAS appears more useful in detecting changes in neurocognitive outcome related to side of surgery. Controlling for postsurgical seizure outcome did not change the results, although continued seizures did have a deleterious effect on both FAS and RFFT, regardless of site of surgery.

Adolescent↗

PubMed2002

Facial affect recognition in criminal psychopaths.

Prior studies provide consistent evidence of deficits for psychopaths in processing verbal emotional material but are inconsistent regarding nonverbal emotional material. To examine whether psychopaths exhibit general versus specific deficits in nonverbal emotional processing, 34 psychopaths and 33 nonpsychopaths identified with Hare's (R. D. Hare, 1991) Psychopathy Checklist--Revised were asked to complete a facial affect recognition test. Slides of prototypic facial expressions were presented. Three hypotheses regarding hemispheric lateralization anomalies in psychopaths were also tested (right-hemisphere dysfunction, reduced lateralization, and reversed lateralization). Psychopaths were less accurate than nonpsychopaths at classifying facial affect under conditions promoting reliance on right-hemisphere resources and displayed a specific deficit in classifying disgust. These findings demonstrate that psychopaths exhibit specific deficits in nonverbal emotional processing.

Adult↗