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Brain activation patterns elicited by the 'Faces Symbol Test' – a pilot fMRI study

¹ Institute of Psychology, University of Graz, Austria and 2Section of Neuroradiology, Department of Radiology, Medical University of Graz, Austria
² Institute of Psychology, University of Graz, Austria
³ Department of Neurology, Medical University of Graz, Austria
⁴ Section of Neuroradiology, Department of Radiology, Medical University of Graz, Austria
⁵ Section of Neuroradiology, Department of Radiology, Medical University of Graz, Austria and 3Department of Neurology, Medical University of Graz, Austria

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed.

	Abstract

The Faces Symbol Test (FST) has recently been proposed as a brief and patient-friendly screeninginstrument for the assessment of cognitive dysfunction in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS).However, in contrast to well-established MS screening tests such as the Paced Auditory Serial AdditionTest, the neural correlates of the FST have not been investigated so far. In the present study, we developeda functional MRI (fMRI) version of the FST to provide first data on brain regions and networksinvolved in this test. A sample of 19 healthy participants completed a version of the FST adapted forfMRI, requiring matching of faces and symbols in a multiple choice test and two further experimentalconditions drawing on cognitive subcomponents (face matching and symbol matching). Imagingdata showed a differential involvement of a fronto-parieto-occipital network in the three conditions.The most demanding FST condition elicited brain activation patterns related with sustained attentionand executive control. These results suggest that the FST recruits brain networks critical for higherordercognitive functions often impaired in MS patients.

Key Words: cognition; Faces Symbol Test; functional MRI; multiple sclerosis

First published on January 21, 2008, doi:10.1177/1352458507084030

Multiple Sclerosis 2008;14:354.

A more recent version of this article appeared on April 1, 2008


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