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CBU Rehabilitation Research News
These pages contain news items from the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Rehabilitation Group and summaries of our latest published research findings. It is designed to be of interest to members of the public and press who may not have a background in psychology or science.
December 2011. Tom Manly returns to Science Stand-up at New Year Bright Club event.
CBU researcher Tom Manly returned to Bright Club London for a New Year's Eve event that included both Bright Club and Science Show-offs. The event, which featured Helen Keen (Radio 4) and Joe Lycett (BBC 1) is an initiative of UCL Science Outreach supremo Steve Cross and blended science, comedy and music to a capacity crowd at London's Willmington Arms. Science show-offs is an open-mike night for scientists organised by Loise Crane and MC'd by Steve Cross. Both events happen at monthly intervals (or there abouts) so check the links above for the latest news.
December 2011. Michael Posner's Cognitive Neuroscience of Attention published
Mike Posner (editor) Cogntive Neuroscience of attention was published today by Guildford Publications. The book contains a chapter by the CBU's John Duncan and Tom Manly on the fronto-parietal attention system.
September 2011. CBU contributes to the British Science Festival.
CBU researchers Dean Mobbs and Tom Many contributed to the event Art in Mind at the British Science Festival held in Bradfor. The event, organised by Tom in his role as President of the British Science Association Psychology Section brought together researchers and artists. Dean talked how fear occurs and develops in the brain whilst fiction author (and neuroscientist) Charles Fernyhough discussed tricks for a writer to develop suspense on the page and screen. Professor Sophie Scott of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience talked about speech production with illustrations of the amazing vocal dexterity of actor and impressionist Duncan Wisbey. Dr Zarinah Agnew (UCL) talked about motor skill learning, ably demonstrated by the current UK Beatboxing champion Patrick Hirst (aka Ball-Zee, pictured), who gallantly stepped in a short notice for this well attended and received event. Watch his extraordinary skills here.
July 2011. The Pardoxical Brain published by Cambridge University Press
The Paradoxical Brain edited by Narinder Kapur with Alvaro Pascual-Leone, Vilayanur Ramachandran, Jonathan Cole, Sergio Della Sala, the CBU's Tom Manly and Andrew Mayes was published today by Cambridge Univeristy Press. You can look at the contents pages here. Tom contributed the chapter Paradoxes in Neurorehabilitation (with Narinder Kapur and Ian Robertson) and to the introductory and closing chapters. It is available in Hardback and Kindle form
March 2011. CBU's Tom Manly to perform stand-up comedy at Bright Club.
CBU scientist Tom Manly will perform stand-up comedy for the first time at the Bright Club "Big" event on the 15th March, 2011. Bright Club is a collaboration between comedy promoters One Green Firework, music promoters Duel in the Deep and University College London. It began as an experiment in combining comedians, musicians and scientists and has proved a huge success with events regularly outselling venue capacities. The aim is for the scientists to put across their work or their field in an interesting, humorous and engaging way. The Venue is the Wilmington Arms, Roesbery Avenue, Islington/Finsbury, London. (images from the night courtesy of Hilary Jackson, UCL)
February 2011. British Science Festival, Bradford 10-15 September 2011
As current President of the British Science Association Psychology Section, the CBU's Tom Manly will be organising an event at this years festival. The event is designed to appeal to a broad public audience and be entertaining as well as informative. More details to follow - watch this space. For details on the Festival.
February 2011. Paper examining the efficacy of Goal Management Training is published and freely available on-line
Rehabilitation of executive functioning in patients with frontal lobe brain damage with Goal Management Training, by Brian Levine, Tom A. Schweizer, Charlene O'Connor, Gary Turner, Susan Gillingham, Donald T Stuss, Tom Manly, Ian H. Robertson, published in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience.
Lead author on the study, Brian Levine of the Rotman Research Institute, University of Toronto, Canada.
The paper can be found here http://www.frontiersin.org/human_neuroscience/10.3389/fnhum.2011.00009/abstract
January 2011. Barbara Wilson receives Ramon Y Cahal Award for 2011.
Barbara Wilson former Unit member and now distinguished CBU Visitor has received Ramon Y Cahal Award for 2011 from the International Neuropsychiatric Association. She will go to Chennai, India to give an address and receive this honour.
Professor Barbara Wilson (OBE)
December 2010. Award named after CBU Scientist Barbara Wilson
The British Psychological Society's Division of Neuropsychology has named its award for Significant Contributions to Neuropsychological Rehabilitation the Barbara Wilson Award. The first recipient of this award is Michael Oddy.
July 2010: CBU Scientists take to the festivals.
Tom Manly, Jessica Grahn, Adrian Owen, Dean Mobbs and Tristan Bekinschtein will be presenting at The Secret Garden Party festival in Huntingdon as part of Guerilla Science. On 22nd July, Tom will be talking about "The illusion of self". On the 23rd Jess will tak about "Rhythm and the Brain", Adrian about "Waking the dead?", and Dean about anxiety "Be afraid". On 24th Tristan will be talking about sleep.
(CBU's Tom Manly and Jessica Grahn induce the rubber hand illusion in festival goers at the 2010 Secret Garden Party, 2010)
May 2009 Rehabilitation research at the CBU moves to the Herchel Smith Building
After over a decade based at Elsworth House on the Addenbrooke's site, the CBU Rehabilitation Group is moving as part of an exciting wider development of Clinical Neurosciences in Cambridge.
The Herchel Smith Building at Addenbrooke's Hospital (see left) has been refurbished in a joint venture between the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, Cambridge University (Departments of Psychiatry and Clinical Neurosciences), and the MRC and Wellcome Trust funded Behavioural & Clinical Neurosciences Institute. The refurbishment was further supported by grants from the Medical Research Council (in addition to that via the CBU and BCNI) and the National Institute of Health Research. This new, federated facility for translational cognitive neuroscience consists of about 1000 square metres of office and meeting space and a clinical research facility. In addition to housing 50 staff, there are facilities for electroencephalography (EEG), transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), cognitive testing and blood sampling. The building is near to other research groups on the Forvie site, neuroimaging facilities and neurological and rehabilitation services in Addenbrooke's Hospital.
Find the Herchel Smith Building using an interactive map.
In addition to the rehabilitation group, researchers from the CBU working on states of lowered awareness (led by Adrian Owen) and on affective disorders (led by Tim Dalgleish and Barney Dunn) are also moving to the development. The aim is not, however, to separate out translational projects from the main CBU site at Chaucer Road, but rather to form a productive interface for developing and implementing ideas across groups with many similar interests working in other departments.
It is one of a number of recent initiatives that should greatly strengthen clinically relevant research at the CBU, including the development of a Cambridge Community Head Injury Team (funded by the Evelyn Trust) and a Child Brain Injury Rehabilitation Unit to be developed in Fulbourne.
The building was originally commissioned following a gift to the University of Cambridge from Dr Herchel Smith and was opened in 1984.
The move will mean that telephone and fax numbers for staff previously at Elsworth House will be changing. The following numbers are currently confirmed
Beth Parkin 01223 760 688
Eve Greenfield 01223 760 686
Gemma Hardy 01223 760 687
The rest will follow shortly. Email addresses will remain as before. For the short term, please use the following post address MRC CBU, 15 Chaucer Road, Cambridge CB2 7EF.
February 2009: Video used to detect subtle forms of a serious neurological condition.
Video may have killed the radio star and cause us to spend much too much time on YouTube but, according to a forthcoming paper in the journal Neuropsychology, it may help to detect milder forms of a debilitating neurological condition. Researchers with the Medical Research Council in Cambridge (UK) in the paper report work with patients who show a curious lack of awareness for the left side of space. Such "Unilateral Spatial Neglect" is caused by damage to the right hand side of the brain by stroke and affects thousands of people in the UK alone. It can have very dramatic effects. For example, patients may only wash and dress the right side of their bodies, may eat food only from the right side of the plate, and can completely ignore people approaching from the left. There is also troubling evidence that the disorder can slow down recovery more generally, leading people to spend more time in hospitals and nursing homes. Such findings show the importance of detecting even mild forms of the condition, currently commonly assessed using simple bedside tasks such as asking patients to cross out all the small stars scattered over a page. Researchers at the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit looked at whether videoing patients as they took these tests increased the sensitivity of the measurement. Having an accurate record or where and when patients did their crossing out had a number of benefits. Firstly it turned out that the speed of patients' crossing-out (and variations in this speed) formed more sensitive measures than looking simply at which targets had been marked. The waxing and waning of concentration that this implies fits with research showing that patients' lack of awareness tends to be accompanied by problems in maintaining an alert state. Secondly, the patients showed a pattern of slowing as they went further to the left side of the sheet that was entirely absent in healthy volunteers. This means that patients may be able to find all of the stars eventually and yet still be showing important aspects of the disorder – something that would be missed without video. A final advantage was in accurately capturing a curious tendency of patients to return to and re-cross out stars that they had already completed (sometimes as many as 20 times). This is very difficult to track accurately without video. Such features are important given indications that general levels of disorganisation may be prolonging the disorder. For more information on these findings, click here
To learn more about unilateral neglect click here or here
Visit the APA Journal Neuropsychology
Useful references
1. Paolucci S, Antonucci G, Grasso MG, Bragoni M, Coiro P, De Angelis D et al. Functional outcome of ischemic and hemorrhagic stroke patients after inpatient rehabilitation a matched comparison. Stroke 2003;34(12):2861-5.
2. Paolucci S, Grasso MG, Antonucci G, Bragoni M, Troisi E, Morelli D et al. Mobility status after inpatient stroke rehabilitation: 1-year follow-up and prognostic factors. Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation 2001;82(1):2-8.
3. Manly T, Ward S, Robertson IH. The Rehabilitation of Attention. In: Eslinger PJ, editor. Neuropsychological Interventions: Emerging Treatment and Management Models for Neuropsychological Impairments. 2002.
4. Manly T, Woldt K, Watson P, Warburton E. Is motor perseveration in unilateral neglect 'driven' by the presence of neglected left-sided stimuli? Neuropsychologia 2002;40(11):1794 -- 803.
5. Manly T. Cognitive Rehabilitation for Unilateral Neglect. Neuropsychological Rehabilitation 2002;12(4):289-310.
6. Robertson IH, Halligan PW. Spatial Neglect: A Clinical Handbook for Diagnosis and Treatment. Hove: Psychology Press; 1999.
7. Husain M, Rorden C. Non-Spatially lateralized mechanisms in hemispatial neglect. 2003;Nature Reviews Neuroscience(4):26-36.
January 2009:Professor Jon Evans interviews Tom Manly for the BPS Division of Neuropsychogy Newsletter.
Professor Jon Evans recently interviewed the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit Rehabilitation Group's Tom Manly for the British Neuropsychological Society's Division of Neuropsychology newsletter. The interview was timed to coincide with the award to Tom of Spearman Medal from the British Psychological Society. It is a somewhat lighthearted exchange between two researchers with a long collaboration and can be read here.
January 2009:Lifetime achievement award for Barbara Wilson
The British Psychological Society announced that Barbara Wilson would receive its lifetime achievement award. Professor Barbara Wilson, a key member of the Unit from 1990-2008 and now a Unit Visitor, has been honoured for her work with brain injury rehabilitation and neurological disorders.
For over 30 years Barbara has been dedicated to brain injury rehabilitation, in both clinical practice and clinical research, and is an accomplished academic and dedicated practitioner.
A key issue for Barbara was raising awareness of the need for treatment of psychological problems after brain injury. Her skill lay in the ability to make these complex topics understandable and applicable to the everyday work of a range of healthcare professionals. Her contributions to numerous television and radio programmes on cognitive problems after brain injury has helped to educate the lay audiences about the psychological consequences of acquired brain injury.
Barbara's dedication is reflected in the number of awards she has received from scientific, professional and groups representing people who have suffered a brain injury. She is a Fellow of the Society, The 
Academy of Medical Sciences and The Academy of Learned Societies in Social Sciences and was awarded an OBE in 1998 for services to medical rehabilitations.
From 1990 until her recent retirement Barbara was employed as a senior scientist here at the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge, and she was instrumental in developing the Oliver Zangwill Centre (part of Cambridgeshire Community Services) for Neuropsychological rehabilitation in 1996. The Centre provides an intensive holistic neuropsychology rehabilitation day programme which is recognised worldwide for its excellence. She has also had 17 books, over 250 journal articles published and established 10 widely used neuropsychological tests.
As Professor Huw Williams, Associate Professor of Clinical Psychology commented; 'Barbara transformed the area of neuro-rehabilition by inspiring professionals, survivors of injury or disease, and policy shapers with her enthusiasm, intellect, wit and perseverance. Barbara is a role model for those who aspire to make a contribution to society through psychology.'
We are delighted to congratulate Barbara on this outstanding award.
(Pictures top to bottom. Barbara leading a successful staff occupation of the Rivermead Rehabilitation Unit in Oxford in the 1980s; Barbara accepting flowers at the British Neuropsychological Society's festschrift to honour her contribution in 2006; Barbara and her husband, the publisher Mick Wilson)
October 2008: The Rehabilitation Group Welcomes New Members
The Rehab group has two new members of staff - Gemma Hardy (left) and Sinead Hynes (right). Gemma Hardy joined the group in July, as a Visiting Researcher from the Oliver Zangwill Centre for Neuropsychological Rehabilitation in Ely. She is working on the Assisted Intention Monitoring (AIM) Study. Sinead Hynes has just begun her PhD studies after training as an Occupational Therapist in Ireland. Watch this space for more information about Gemma and Sinead's research!
June 2008: Tom Manly is awarded the Spearman Medal by the British Psychological Society
Tom Manly has recently been awarded the British Psychological Society's Spearman Medal. This prestigious award is presented in recognition of significant theoretical contributions to psychology. Tom will receive the award and give a lecture about his work at the annual conference of the BPS in Brighton next year. You can find out more about Tom's research by visiting the Rehab Research Summary pages.
To visit the British Psychological Society, click here
To see the BPS's coverage of the Spearman award, click here
14th April 2008: Barbara Wilson runs the 2008 London Marathon!
Barbara Wilson running the 2008 London Marathon.
Professor Barbara Wilson (OBE) yesterday completed the London Marathon in 6 hours, 7 minutes and 30 seconds and raised £ 6,846.48 for The Compassionate Friends. Barbara, who established the Rehabilitation Research Group at the CBU and continues as a visitor following her retirement last year, came 35th overall in women of her age group. The Compassionate Friends assist families towards the positive resolution of grief following the death of a child of any age and provide information to help others be supportive.
Bored? Tired? What's left? How boring people helps us to understand why half the world seems to disappear after a stroke.
Research shortly to be published in the journal Neuropsychology suggests that boring people (as in making people bored rather than people who are boring!) can give us clues to understanding why, for some people, half the world seems to disappear after a stroke. "It is as if half the world has gone missing. People with this problem may have perfect vision but not notice people approaching from one side, only dress one side of their body and only eat food from one side of the plate" said Dr Tom Manly of the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge where the research was a carried out. "It's a curious but surprisingly common condition in the early days following a stroke," he added "fortunately most people appear to get better quite quickly. Those who have neglect in the longer term almost always have damage to the right side of the brain and miss information from their left. This is one of the many puzzles about the disorder". Work in Cambridge and elsewhere has suggested that unilateral neglect may persist because of other effects of damage to the right hemisphere of the brain, particularly people's ability to maintain an awake, alert state. In work published in Neuropsychology, Dr Chris Dodds and his colleagues tested the theory that the pattern seen in patients may be a very amplified form of a normal change that occurs with low levels of alertness. They asked healthy people without any sort of brain injury to look at a computer screen. In each go of the task a circle of six letters appeared very briefly on the screen and those taking part were asked to say as many letters as possible. As this rather boring test went on, people slowly began to report more letters from the right and fewer from the left of the screen. "If you do this task over and over again it is quite tedious and your levels of alertness begin to decline. As this happens you seem to get more and more biased to the right and more likely to miss information on the left. This may help us to explain why patients who show unilateral neglect for a long time have low levels of alertness and almost always miss information from the left – they are showing an extreme form of a normal pattern" said Dr Manly. He added "The changes in healthy people are very subtle and can only be seen with a very sensitive test. We don't think that people show the severe problems that patients experience after stroke although, of course, when you are driving or doing other dangerous activities, keeping alert is very useful in every respect. The importance of the findings lie in what they tell us about the clinical condition after stroke".
For more information about this research contact Chris Dodds or Tom Manly
MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit
Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society
The effects of time-on-task and concurrent cognitive load on normal visuospatial bias. Christopher M. Dodds, Janna Van Belle, Polly V. Peers, Anja Dove, Rhodri Cusack, John Duncan, Tom Manly (in press, Neuropsychology)
January 2008: Quick march left right?: How fears about being late helps us to understand why half the world can disappear after stroke – and how we might get it back.
Research just published in the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society has uncovered clues in understanding why half of the world can suddenly disappear after a stroke. Dr Melanie George and her colleagues worked with people who suffer from 'unilateral spatial neglect'. "It is as if half the world has gone missing. People with this problem may have perfect vision but not notice people approaching from one side, only dress one side of their body and only eat food from one side of the plate" said Dr Tom Manly of the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge where the work was carried out. "It's a curious but surprisingly common condition in the early days following a stroke," he added "fortunately most people appear to get better quite quickly. Those who have neglect in the longer term almost always have damage to the right side of the brain and miss information from their left. This is one of the many puzzles about the disorder". Work in Cambridge and elsewhere has suggested that unilateral neglect may persist because of other effects of damage to the right hemisphere of the brain, particularly people's ability to maintain an awake, alert state. Melanie George and her colleagues tested this theory in a very simple way. If you tell people that there is a time limit when they are performing a task it causes a mild increase in levels of arousal (imagine sitting exams or being late for a meeting). The researchers asked patients with neglect to look at a sheet of paper and cross out all the stars printed on it. When patients were told they had as much time as they wanted, they missed many stars on the left of the sheet. When they repeated the test with the belief that there was a time limit, they found significantly more of these stars. When they did the test for a third time and were again told that they had as much time as was needed, their tendency to 
ignore the left returned. In fact, in all conditions they had as much time as they needed and it was just the belief that there was a time limit that made the difference. Dr Manly said "This is a clear demonstration that patients do have the capacity to notice information on the left but this seems to lie dormant for much of the time. That a simple belief can help them to use this ability is potentially very good news for rehabilitation - if we can help them to make use of this in the longer term."
Illustrations. A patient with left spatial neglect's drawing of a man from memory and attempts to find and cross out all of the lines on a page. In both cases almost all information from the left has been omitted.
George, M.S., Mercer, J.S., Walker, R., & Manly, T. (2008). A demonstration of endogenous modulation of unilateral spatial neglect: The impact of apparent time-pressure on spatial bias. Journal Of The International Neuropsychological Society, 14(1):33-41. [request reprint]
For more information about this research contact Tom Manly
MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit
Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society
04/12/2007: Substantial Research for Patient Benefit (RfPB) Grant Awarded for Translational CBU/Oliver Zangwill Centre Collaboration
A team of researchers and clinicians from the Oliver Zangwill Centre for Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, the MRC Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit, and the University of Glasgow have been awarded a grant of approximately £250,000 by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Research for Patient Benefit (RfPB) programme (see here). The team includes CBU scientists Tom Manly, Barbara Wilson and Jessica Fish. The grant is set to employ two full time researchers over 36 months to on "a randomised control trial of the impact of electronically delivered 'content-free' cueing on psychosocial functioning following brain injury". It is a full scale clinical evaluation of techniques developed and tested in smaller scale research at the CBU (Fish, et al. 2007; Manly, et al. 2002; Manly, et al. 2004).
Following brain injury, many patients have problems achieving day-to-day tasks due to memory, attentional and executive impairments. However, there are few well-controlled studies that demonstrate effectiveness of training or compensatory strategies on everyday behaviour. One exception to this is a simple paging system (NeuroPage; Hersch and Treadgold, 1992) that sends messages to people with memory and/or planning problems, reminding them of their day-to-day tasks. A series of studies have demonstrated the efficacy of this system (Wilson et al., 1997, 2001, 2005; Fish et al., 2007). More recently, research conducted at the MRC-CBU suggests that a so-called 'content free' alert, a simple 'bleep' associated with the instruction to stop and think, or to pay attention to the task at hand, can improve brain injured participants' performance on laboratory tasks (Manly et al., 2002, 2004), and a researcher-defined task taking place over a two-week time period (Fish et al., 2007). This type of general reminder has the potential to benefit a much wider array of tasks than those addressed by systems like NeuroPage, where tasks tend to be specific and regularly occurring, such as taking medication. However, the effect of this technique on patients' completion their own day-to-day tasks has yet to be examined.
The RfPB grant will fund a randomised controlled crossover trial to study the effect of 'content free' alerts delivered to brain injured participants via mobile phone on patients' achievement of identified day-to-day tasks. Effects of the strategy upon both patient and carer well-being will also be examined. If the research provides support for this technique, a service will be developed to efficiently translate these findings into benefits for patients. Subsidiary research questions relating to the external validity of clinical tests of cognitive function will also be addressed within the context of this study (i.e. correspondence between performance on standardised assessments and target attainment at baseline).
28/07/06: Jessica Fish is awarded the Philip Rennick award
Jessica Fish, an MRC-funded PhD student, is awarded the Philip Rennick award for the best submission by a graduate student at the International Neuropsychological Society meeting in Zurich, July 2006.
See: Fish, J., Manly, T. and Wilson, B.A. (2006). "Modulation of executive functioning in acquired brain injury." Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society 12 (S2).
Abstract: A principal aim in the assessment of executive functioning is the prediction of problems in everyday life. The assumption that tests predict everyday performance is by no means unequivocally supported by research findings (Burgess et al, 1998), though the development of ecologically valid tests is helping to improve the situation. Most assessment procedures share one major drawback: they tell us very little about variability in performance. We have used methods that attempt to gauge this variability, with reference to prospective memory rehabilitation. We used a naturalistic task, in which patients are asked to make four daily telephone calls to a voicemail service, and found significant facilitation of performance when a text message based alerting strategy was used. A second study investigated how different aspects of executive functioning are influenced by motivational salience, employing traditional experimental research methodology. We would argue that measuring variability in, rather than absolute level of, performance, provides a better reflection of everyday function than standard snapshotassessment procedures, as well as providing theoretical insight into the cognitive processes involved in these complex behaviours, and clinical insight regarding the implementation of rehabilitation strategies.
Tom Manly is awarded the British Neuropsychological Elizabeth Warrington Prize
Tom Manly is awarded the British Neuropsychological Elizabeth Warrington Prize for 2006 (see http://www.psychology.nottingham.ac.uk/bns/)
Mobile phones offer clues to memory problems following brain injury
For full news story click here.
05/05/06 - Barbara Wilson is awarded the Robert L. Moody Prize
Barbara Wilson is awarded the Robert L. Moody Prize for Distinguished Initiatives in Brain Injury Research and Rehabilitation. This prize is awarded annually by the University of Texas Medical Branch to honour and recognise individuals or a team who have made a significant contribution in acquired brain injury rehabilitation and research. The objective of the award is to increase national and international awareness of the need to expand and improve treatment for persons who have experienced brain injury, stroke and related nervous system insults. Criteria to be considered by a panel of experts include the total impact of a candidate's work, achievements and unique contributions as well as recognition by peers within the scientific and rehabilitation communities. The award was presented to Barbara Wilson on 5 th May 2006 in Galveston at the sixth annual Galveston Brain injury Conference which, this year, focused on issues affecting children with traumatic brain injury. Barbara Wilson is the only non-American to have been honoured with this award.
The 4th INS Satellite Symposium on Neuropsychological Rehabilitation. 9th/10th July 2007, Sala Andia Kutxa, San Sebastian, Spain.
Following successful meetings in Australia , Ireland and Liechtenstein , the next satellite symposium on neuropsychological rehabilitation organised around the INS summer meeting has been announced. The meeting will take place in San Sebastian ( Spain ) at Sala Andia Kutxa on 9th - 10th July 2007. To download a flyer click here.
For more information and on-line booking go to www.koenigundmueller.de
Abstracts to be sent to Michael Perdices (programme chair) mperdices@nsccahs.gov.au
Submission deadline 31st January 2007.
Abstracts should be no longer than 300 words and be formatted in 3 sections, Aims (including background), Methods and Results - with a concluding remark about implications etc. If it is very difficult to fit your abstract into that format (e.g. describing the development of a clinical service rather than a scientific study - these will be considered but should also not exceed 300 words.
23/03/06 - Barbara Wilson (OBE) honoured by the British Neuropsychological Society
On the 23rd March, 2006 The British Neuropsychological Society held a festschrift to honour the contribution of Barbara Wilson to neuropsychology and particularly neuropsychological rehabilitation. The symposium, chaired by Narinder Kapur, featured talks from Myrna Schwartz, Elizabeth Glisky, Alan Baddeley, Ian Robertson, Jon Evans and Linda Clare. Barbara Wilson is a senior Scientist at the Medical Research Council Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit. Click here to see some pictures taken during the day.
New clues to understanding attention deficit hyperactivity disorder in children
Children suffering from Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) may be ignoring visual information to their left and being diagnosed mistakenly as having dyslexia, according to new research by Dr Tom Manly and colleagues at the Medical Research Council (MRC) Cognition and Brain Sciences Unit in Cambridge and published in Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Brain and Cognition. The latest of three recent papers on the subject, published today, shows that this 'left neglect' phenomenon is more widespread in children than previously thought.
The research, conducted by Dr Manly and colleagues Dr Veronika Dobler and Melanie George, showed that children with ADHD might simply stop noticing things to their left, particularly when they are doing boring or unstimulating tasks. The phenomenon of 'left neglect' is well-known in adults who have suffered right-sided brain injury, who can act as if half the world has simply disappeared. Some children with ADHD, who had no brain damage and perfectly normal intelligence, showed 'left neglect' quite as severe as that seen in some adults with substantial damage to the right side of the brain. Remarkably, the studies show that most children's awareness of things to their left - but not their right – significantly declines if they are asked to perform a boring task for about 40 minutes.
The research published today shows that even perfectly healthy children can begin to lose some awareness of information on the left with boredom. Dr Manly said, "The right side of our brain seems to be heavily involved in keeping us awake and alert, particularly when we are bored. Because the right side of the brain is interested in what is going on to our left and vice versa, as this alertness declines over time or with boredom, it takes some of our awareness of the left with it. All children lose information disproportionately from the left, but children with ADHD appear to reach this point more quickly and to a greater extent than other children unless they are given stimulant medication.
Dr Manly highlighted the phenomenon in his earlier studies, "One boy with ADHD we worked with tended to ignore the first letters in words, reading 'TRAIN' as 'RAIN' and 'FLOAT' as 'OAT'. Another boy would miss details from the left in his drawing and compress his writing or drawing only into the right hand side of the page."
Dr Manly claims that this difficulty with noticing things on the left has often gone undiscovered because it is not routinely assessed. The problems may be attributed incorrectly to dyslexia or clumsiness.
He concludes, "We have no idea how many children are affected, or if they grow out of it or if it is permanent. However, there are some effective treatments for this problem in adults and our early studies suggest they may work for children, but more research is needed. Nevertheless, improving early assessment in children should be a priority."