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Employing executive functions of perceptual and memory abilities in underweight and weight-restored anorexia nervosa patients

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Abstract

Purpose

Executive functions (EF) have been widely investigated in anorexia nervosa (AN) revealing difficulties in various aspects. We aimed at testing the effects of EF on stimuli perception and its representations in memory.

Methods

Thirty AN underweight patients, 30 weight-restored AN patients, and 44 control participants, were recruited. Various EF were assessed using the Rey–Osterrieth Complex Figure Test, analyzed with the Boston Qualitative Scoring System.

Results

No differences were found in visuo-constructional measures in either AN groups compared to controls on the copy and memory stages. However, both groups performed significantly worse than controls on most EF variables in the copy stage, while in the immediate and delayed memory stages the difference was less substantial.

Conclusions

Difficulties in EF among AN patients, current and weight restored, are more pronounced in the perceptual module and less so when employed through memory retrieval. The pattern, which is apparent after weight gain, suggests that there is no ameliorative effect on these difficulties.

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Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Michal Gutman for helping to code and organize the data.

Conflict of interest

On behalf of all authors, the corresponding author states that there is no conflict of interest.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Day Treatment Rehabilitation Unit, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel

    Eyal Heled

  2. Department of Psychology, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel

    Eyal Heled, Dan Hoofien & Eytan Bachar

  3. The National Institute for the Rehabilitation of the Brain Injured, Tel Aviv, Israel

    Dan Hoofien

  4. Department of Psychiatry, Hadassah University Medical Center, Jerusalem, Israel

    Eytan Bachar

  5. Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Clalit Health Services, Hebrew University, Jerusalem, Israel

    Rena Cooper-Kazaz

  6. Department of Eating Disorders, Sheba Medical Center, Ramat Gan, Israel

    Eitan Gur

  7. Department of Psychology, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Republic of Singapore

    Richard P. Ebstein

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  1. Eyal Heled
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Correspondence to Eyal Heled.

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Heled, E., Hoofien, D., Bachar, E. et al. Employing executive functions of perceptual and memory abilities in underweight and weight-restored anorexia nervosa patients. Eat Weight Disord 19, 479–487 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40519-014-0119-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40519-014-0119-2

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