Spatial attention in HIV-1 infection: a preliminary report

Abstract

In a preliminary study, 30 nondemented human immunodeficiency virus (HIV-1) seropositive subjects without acquired immunodeficiency syndrome and 14 seronegative controls performed a reaction time measure of spatial attention. Compared with controls, seropositive asymptomatic subjects showed normal facilitation of reaction time at short cue-target intervals when attention was precued, but symptomatic subjects were impaired. However, asymptomatic subjects showed no evidence of normal inhibition of attention at the cued location at longer cue-target intervals, suggesting possible subtler spatial attentional deficits in this group. Cognitive slowing in HIV-1 infection may have an attentional component, with possible involvement of both automatic and controlled processes.

Accelerated and accentuated neurocognitive aging in HIV infection

“…This study utilized clinical measures of attention (i.e., digit span and single trial word-list learning,) that are non-specific tasks involving other overlapping domains (e.g., speed of information processing) and thus may not offer insights into the neural or precise neurocognitive mechanisms underlying accelerated/accentuated cognitive aging in HIV. As such, future studies may study this domain more carefully and experimentally using detailed, theoretically-informed tasks designed to assess underlying cognitive networks of attention that might be susceptible to HIV (e.g., Hinkin et al 2000; Martin et al 1992), and show a pattern of accelerated aging. Tasks that are grounded in theoretical models of attention, such as those proposed by Dennis and colleagues (2008), Knudsen (2007), Posner and Rothbart (2007), or Wang and Fan (2007), may provide such insights.…”