Neuropsychological Performance in Gulf War Era Veterans: Motivational Factors and Effort

Assuming that the underlying etiology of unexplained health-related symptoms in returning Gulf War (GW) veterans is multifactorial, the possible role of feigning or exaggeration of symptoms is worth consideration as a contributing factor. The present study assessed the relationship between motivation to perform well during neuropsychological assessment and objective neuropsychological test performance. Motivation was measured as the score on a visual memory task (Test of Memory Malingering, TOMM) of low difficulty. Participants included 77 veterans from the cohorts of GW- (n = 58) and Germany-deployed (n = 19) GW-era veterans described in two other papers in this issue who were administered the TOMM. Most veterans earned perfect or near-perfect scores on the TOMM (48–50/50). Scores 47 were associated with lower scores on neuropsychological tasks assessing attention, executive functions, and memory. Variability in test performance within and between tasks measuring similar functions was also found in participants with lower TOMM scores.     

Parafoveal processing of transposed-letter words and nonwords: evidence against parafoveal lexical activation

The current experiments explored the parafoveal processing of transposed-letter (TL) neighbors by using an eye-movement-contingent boundary change paradigm. In Experiment 1 readers received a parafoveal preview of a target word (e.g., calm) that was either (1) identical to the target word (calm), (2) a TL-neighbor (clam), or (3) a substituted-letter (SL) nonword (chem). In Experiment 2 a further set of parafoveal preview conditions was explored including (4) an SL-word condition (chum) and (5) a TL-nonword condition (caml). Across both experiments, readers' fixation durations on the target words were significantly longer when the previews were SL previews than when they were TL neighbors, suggesting that TL neighbors (when presented in the parafovea) facilitate processing rather than inhibit processing. Experiments 3 and 4 showed that this is in contrast to the inhibitory effects that are seen when TL neighbor previews appear in the fovea.     

Self-Report Measures to Identify Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and/or Mild Traumatic Brain Injury and Associated Symptoms in Military Veterans of Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF)/Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF)

Individuals serving in Iraq and Afghanistan sustain injuries associated with physical and psychological trauma. Among such injuries, mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) and post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are common. Self-report measures are frequently used to identify mTBI and/or PTSD and symptoms associated with these conditions. In addition to providing information regarding mTBI and PTSD, the goal of this literature review was to identify and present information on the psychometric properties of measures used to obtain information regarding these common conditions among Veterans who have returned from Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF)/Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF). A comprehensive review of studies in which self-report measures were used to evaluate mTBI, PTSD, and associated symptoms among OEF/OIF Veterans is presented. Findings suggest that additional work is needed to identify psychometrically sound and clinically useful self-report measures that assess mTBI and PTSD and associated symptoms among OEF/OIF Veterans.