The study by Owen et al. (1991) is different from others since it compares the extra-dimensional shift (EDS) and intra-dimensional shift (IDS) between non-medicated and medicated patients of Parkinson disease.
The hypothesis of the study was to determine whether the cognitive functions of the frontal lobe system are vulnerable to the impacts of aging.
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The hypothesis was attributed by previous researches of healthy elderly subjects who were impaired on the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test.
Methods
The participants involved in the study include neurosurgical patients, those who have undergone temporal lobe lesions, and amygdalo-hippocampus removal.
The study was ethical, and respondents’ rights were respected, and researchers used recommended designs by SLAMECKA (Owen et al., 1991).
The rationale of the study was to compare IDS and EDS between younger and elderly individuals, something that has never been done before. The primary advantage was to understand the functions of frontal lobes while the disadvantage was by involving neurosurgical patients.
Results
The dependent variable was the frontal lobe functions while the independent variables were medicated and non-medicated Parkinson disease’s patients and the elderly.
The significant findings are that temporal lobe and amygdalo-hippocampectomy groups responded slowly as compared to the frontal lobe participants (Owen et al., 1991).
The above finding can be used to support an argument that requires one to examine the impact of lesion laterality on neurosurgical patients’ frontal lobe functions.
Comment or Discussion
The primary implication of the study is that individuals with damaged frontal lobe are impaired in taking the IDS and EDS shifting tests.
The authors explain the occurrence by showing the effects of localized excisions in one’s ability to shift response.
From my perspective, the study has the limitation of involving participants who have not met the established requirements.
The future proposed experiments are to determine the impact of frontal lobes damage to individuals’ personalities and EDS.
Reference
Owen, A. M., Roberts, A. C., Polkey, C. E., Sahakian, B. J., & Robbins, T. W. (1991). Extra-dimensional versus intra-dimensional set shifting performance following frontal lobe excisions, temporal lobe excisions or amygdalo-hippocampectomy in man. Neuropsychologia, 29 (10), 993-1006.
