Background: Visual cognitive dysfunction is one of the most important signs indicating the early stage of dementia. Thus, visual testing could be used as an aid to the clinical diagnosis of dementia. In the present study, exploratory eye movement was measured to evaluate visual cognitive function in elderly subjects, including those with dementia. Methods: We analyzed responsive search scores (RSS) from exploratory eye movements of 300 subjects who were examined with an eye mark recorder while viewing S shaped figures. Subjects were divided into three groups (dementia, intermediate, healthy) from the values of the Revised Hasegawa Dementia Scale (HDS-R), the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Clinical Dementia Rating. We further divided the intermediate groups into two subgroups, the high score and low score groups, based on RSS. In 202 subjects, Z-scores of voxel-based specific regional analysis system for Alzheimer's disease (VSRAD) were obtained from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Results: RSS of the dementia group were significantly lower than those in the intermediate and healthy groups, in order: dementia < intermediate < healthy groups. RSS of the low score intermediate group was significantly lower than that of the high score intermediate group. There was no significant difference between the low score intermediate and dementia groups, or between the high score intermediate and healthy groups. No significant differences of either HSD-R or MMSE were observed between the low score and the high score intermediate groups. The Z-score of VSRAD using MRI in the low score intermediate group was significantly higher than that in the high score intermediate group. Conclusions: These findings suggest that RSS using an eye mark recorder is a useful psychophysiological marker to evaluate the early stage of dementia as well as at-risk elderly people.

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BackgroundTree-drawing test is used as a projective psychological test that expresses the abnormal internal experience in patients with schizophrenia (SZ). Despite the widely accepted view that the cognitive function is involved in characteristic tree-drawing in patients with SZ, no study has psychophysiologically examined it. The present study aimed to investigate the involvement of cognitive function during tree-drawing in patients with SZ. For that purpose, we evaluated the brain function in patients with SZ during a tree-drawing task by using near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) and compared them with those in healthy controls.Patients and methodsThe subjects were 28 healthy controls and 28 patients with SZ. Changes in the oxygenated hemoglobin ([oxy-Hb]) concentration in both the groups during the task of drawing a tree imagined freely (free-drawing task) and the task of copying an illustration of a tree (copying task) were measured by using NIRS.ResultsBecause of the difference between the task conditions, [oxy-Hb] levels in controls during the free-drawing task were higher than that during the copying task at the bilateral frontal pole regions and left inferior frontal region. Because of the difference between the groups, [oxy-Hb] levels at the left middle frontal region, bilateral inferior frontal regions, bilateral inferior parietal regions, and left superior temporal region during the free-drawing task in patients were lower than that in controls.Conclusion[oxy-Hb] during the tree-drawing task in patients with SZ was lower than that in healthy controls. Our results suggest that brain dysfunction in patients with SZ might be associated with their tree-drawing.

We suggest that image-recall tasks related to emotion measured by NIRS might be a visually useful psychophysiological marker to understand the decrease in the frontal lobe function in MDD patients. In particular, we suggest that the decrease in δoxyHb in the left frontal lobe is related to the severity of depression.

Aims:  Emotion‐associated sounds have been suggested to exert important effects upon human personal relationships. The present study was aimed to characterize the effects of the sounds of crying or laughing on visual cognitive function in schizophrenia patients. Methods:  We recorded exploratory eye movements in 24 schizophrenia patients (mean age, 27.0 ± 6.1 years; 14 male, 10 female) and age‐matched controls. The total eye scanning length (TESL) and total number of gaze points in the left (left TNGP) and right (right TNGP) visual fields of the screen and the number of researching areas (NRA) were determined using eye‐mark recording in the presence/absence of emotionally charged sounds. Results:  Controls' TESL for smiling pictures was longer than that for crying pictures irrespective of sounds. Patients' TESL for smiling pictures, however, was shorter than for crying pictures irrespective of the sounds. The left TNGP for smiling pictures was lower in patients than controls independent of sound. Importantly, the right TNGP was significantly larger with laughing sounds than in the absence of sound. In controls, the NRA for smiling pictures was significantly greater than for crying pictures irrespective of sound. Patient NRA did not significantly differ between smiling and crying pictures irrespective of sound. Conclusion:  Eye movements in schizophrenia patients' left field for smiling pictures associated with laughing sounds particularly differed from those in controls, suggesting impaired visual cognitive function associated with positive emotion, also involving pleasure‐related sounds, in schizophrenia.