Impairments in proverb interpretation following focal frontal lobe lesions

Abstract

The proverb interpretation task (PIT) is often used in clinical settings to evaluate frontal “executive” dysfunction. However, only a relatively small number of studies have investigated the relationship between frontal lobe lesions and performance on the PIT. We compared 52 patients with unselected focal frontal lobe lesions with 52 closely matched healthy controls on a proverb interpretation task. Participants also completed a battery of neuropsychological tests, including a fluid intelligence task (Raven’s Advanced Progressive Matrices). Lesions were firstly analysed according to a standard left/right sub-division. Secondly, a finer-grained analysis compared the performance of patients with medial, left lateral and right lateral lesions with healthy controls. Thirdly, a contrast of specific frontal subgroups compared the performance of patients with medial lesions with patients with lateral frontal lesions. The results showed that patients with left frontal lesions were significantly impaired on the PIT, while in patients with right frontal lesions the impairments approached significance. Medial frontal patients were the only frontal subgroup impaired on the PIT, relative to healthy controls and lateral frontal patients. Interestingly, an error analysis indicated that a significantly higher number of concrete responses were found in the left lateral subgroup compared to healthy controls. We found no correlation between scores on the PIT and on the fluid intelligence task. Overall our results suggest that specific regions of the frontal lobes contribute to the performance on the PIT.

General and specialized brain correlates for analogical reasoning: A meta‐analysis of functional imaging studies

“…These findings are also in agreement with previous functional imaging and lesion studies that have demonstrated a left specialization of the PFC for verbal abstraction using proverb interpretation [Murphy et al, 2013], abstract concepts [Hoffman et al, 2010;Lagarde et al, 2015], or metaphor comprehension [Bohrn et al, 2012;Vartanian, 2012].…”

Cognitive Screening in Brain Tumors: Short but Sensitive Enough?

“…Thus, estimated pre-morbid level of intelligence was ascertained in a standard manner by administering the National Adult Reading Test (NART) (24). To ascertain current level of cognitive function, the CA comprised standard published neuropsychological tests that focused on the following domain-specific areas of cognition: (1) Abstract reasoning : non-verbal – Raven’s advanced progressive matrices (25), verbal – Proverb Interpretation Test (26, 27); (2) attention – Digit Span subtest from the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-III (28), Elevator Counting with Distraction from the Test of Everyday Attention (29); (3) verbal and visual memory – Recognition Memory Tests, Words, and Topography (30, 31); (4) visual perception – Incomplete Letters Test from the Visual Object and Space Perception Battery (32); (5) language – Graded Naming Test (33), Word Comprehension – Synonyms Test (34); and (6) executive functions – phonemic word fluency (35), Hayling Sentence Completion Test (36). …”

Propositional speech in unselected stroke: The effect of genre and external support

“…ANOVA with simple post-hoc contrasts with Bonferroni correction applied was used for the sub-group analyses. This method of focused comparison between sub-groups has been previously adopted when comparing stroke aphasia and semantic dementia patients (e.g., Jefferies, Patterson, & Lambon-Ralph, 2008) and frontal sub-groups based on lesion location (e.g., Picton, Stuss, Shallice, Alexander, & Gillingham, 2006;Murphy et al, 2013;Robinson et al, 2010Robinson et al, , 2012.…”