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. 1987 Oct;50(10):1263–1266. doi: 10.1136/jnnp.50.10.1263

Psychomotor slowing and subcortical-type dysfunction in depression.

R P Hart 1, J A Kwentus 1
PMCID: PMC1032447  PMID: 3681304

Abstract

Elderly patients with major depression and normal controls completed the Sternberg short-term memory scanning procedure and WAIS Digit Symbol. Depressed patients demonstrated psychomotor slowing on both tasks, but normal response latency as a function of memory set size on the Sternberg procedure. While cognitive-behavioural slowing may be observed in both depressive illness and subcortical neurological disorders, a normal rate of processing information centrally appears to distinguish depression from certain of these disorders. Psychomotor slowing in the presence of normal information processing speed might be explained by a deficit in motivational state associated with depression.

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Selected References

These references are in PubMed. This may not be the complete list of references from this article.

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