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    The use of mobile phones to compensate for organisational and memory impairment in people with acquired brain injury : a dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Clinical Psychology at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2008) Mackie, Cornè
    Objectives: To investigate the extent to which people with memory difficulties use cognitive aids, and to compare this with that of the general population. Relationships between current memory aid use, age, and such factors as insight into functional difficulties, and pre-injury use of memory aids were examined. To investigate the usefulness of mobile phones in compensation for memory impairment following TBI; To investigate the impact of the type of memory impairment (encoding vs. retrieval), level of insight, and familiarity with technology on the use of mobile phones as cognitive aids. Design: Study One - Survey; Study Two - Repeated Single-case ABAB-design Participants: Study One - A group of 29 participants with memory difficulties due to traumatic brain injury (TBI), and an age-matched control group of 33 participants. Study Two - Six participants were selected from people with TBI in New Zealand. Inclusion criteria were a history of TBI, being over 16-years-old, and both self-reported and formally assessed memory difficulties. Measures: Memory Aids Questionnaire; Patient Competency Rating Scale; Shapiro Control Inventory; Task completion forms. Results: Study One - People with TBI and controls tended to use a similar number and type of aids. Electronic memory aids (EMAs) were viewed as more effective in assisting with remembering, but were used less frequently than non-EMAs. This study found that age may impact on the type of aids used. Study Two - All six participants showed statistically significant improvements in the number of tasks remembered while using the phone vs. not using any aids at all. When comparing the phone and the use of traditional aids, five participants showed statistically significant improvements and one performed worse. These results were maintained at one-month follow-up. While the use of mobile phones to assist with remembering is efficacious in some cases, it is not suitable for use with all individuals.
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    Memory deficits in Parkinson's disease : a thesis presented in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Psychology at Massey University
    (Massey University, 1998) O'Sullivan, Marie
    Twenty-two Parkinson's Disease (PD) patients and 22 age-matched and gender-matched comparison participants (aged 48-83 years) were tested on the California Verbal Learning Test (CVLT), a shopping list memory task with items divided into four semantic categories.. Results supported other research in showing verbal memory deficits in PD. The PD group performance was lower on all recall trials of the CVLT. In addition, ability to discriminate between old and new items was impaired in the PD group. Participants who scored highly on total recall measures also showed a strong ability to use semantic categories in recall. A hierarchical cluster analysis (Ward's method) was used to explore the nature of the memory deficits found. Results support the existence of distinct stages of memory decline in PD, with the differences between subgroups identified showing significance when subjected to an analysis of variance (ANOVA). These results suggest that the memory deterioration which occurs in PD is initially associated with aspects of retrieval. However, as the disease progresses, encoding processes become compromised with more severe effects on memory. An interpretation, based on neural network models of memory, is discussed to suggest reasons why memory processes in PD may fail. These include activation failure, inefficiency of gating mechanisms in encoding and retrieval operations and inability to access semantic memory at the encoding stage of a memory task.
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    Smartphones as prospective memory aids after traumatic brain injury : a dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the degree of Doctor of Clinical Psychology at Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 2014) Bos, Hannah Rose
    Individuals living with traumatic brain injury (TBI) commonly have difficulties with prospective memory—the ability to remember a planned action at the intended time. This can result in difficulties managing every day functioning, and increased reliance on others. Traditionally a memory notebook has been recommended as a compensatory memory aid. Electronic devices have the advantage of providing a cue at the appropriate time to remind participants to refer to the memory aid and complete tasks, and are currently widely used. Research suggests these have potential benefit in neurorehabilitation. This study investigated the efficacy of a memory notebook and specifically a smartphone as a compensatory memory aid. Seven participants with moderate to severe TBI completed the study. Two participants first received the memory notebook, and later the smartphone. The remainder received the smartphone as the memory aid of particular interest. Performance was measured using a message task in which participants were to place a call or text message at an assigned time, and answer a question and were to post a postcard during the week. During weekly sessions, participants rated mood and provided information about their use of the memory aid. Formal measures of prospective memory function, community and household integration and mood were completed at the start of the study, the end of each treatment and at a follow up two to four months after conclusion of the study. The smartphone showed improvements in the ability to complete assigned memory tasks accurately and within the assigned time periods. The benefits of the smartphone occurred over and above benefits seen with those who received a memory notebook first, or who already used a memory notebook on entry to the study. Half the participants learnt to use the smartphone with ease, while others had difficulty. However, despite difficulties participants could still benefit from the smartphone. This study suggests smartphones have the potential to be a useful and cost effective tool in neurorehabilitation practice. This research informs clinicians and researchers of factors that may be important for successful implementation of smartphones as a neurorehabilitation tool.
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    Parkinson's disease : memory deficits : a dissertation presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Psychology at Massey University, New Zealand
    (Massey University, 1999) Whittington, Craig J
    Parkinson's disease (PD) has long been thought of as a debilitating motor disease: only relatively recently has research focused on cognitive functioning. It is now widely accepted that memory processes are among the primary cognitive functions to deteriorate in PD. However, less is known about the role that task variables (e.g., difficulty) and participant characteristics (e.g., gender, disease progression) play in this relationship. In addition, few studies in the PD literature have looked at the important issues of statistical power and the magnitude of memory deficits. The present investigation addressed some of these concerns. The first stage involved conducting a power analysis, based on 48 studies, followed by a meta-analysis. The meta-analysis included 32 effect sizes from studies assessing recognition memory in PD. This analysis paved the way for a large-scale study examining recognition memory in 41 nondemented PD participants compared to 41 age- and education-matched healthy controls. Both verbal and nonverbal recognition tasks were specifically designed for this purpose, the latter employing two levels of difficulty. In addition, prospective memory (remembering to remember) was examined with two event-based tasks because no study to date has looked at this issue in PD. The results of the power analysis indicated that past research has typically had insufficient statistical power to detect all but the largest memory deficits. Integrating the data from many studies, the meta-analysis suggested that nondemented, medicated PD participants may suffer from small recognition deficits. Support was provided by the subsequent primary study. In addition, it was found that the progression of memory impairment operates in parallel with the progression of motor symptoms. Moreover, task demands interacted with disease stage, such that nonverbal recognition deficits were only seen in early-stage PD participants when the task was made more difficult. Conversely, advanced-stage participants produced deficits irrespective of the level of difficulty. With respect to prospective memory, only the advanced-stage participants showed clear evidence of memory impairment. The main outcome of this research is that recognition memory impairment does occur in PD. However, low levels of statistical power in previous research and moderating factors such as symptom severity and task difficulty have likely obscured true deficits.