Elsevier

Cortex

Volume 35, Issue 2, 1999, Pages 263-271
Cortex

Spatial Cognition in Males With Fragile-X Syndrome: Evidence for a Neuropsychological Phenotype

https://doi.org/10.1016/S0010-9452(08)70799-8Get rights and content

Abstract

Spatial performance in a group of young Fragile-X syndrome males with FMR-1 full mutation was compared to a learning disabled control group comprising young Down's syndrome males and two control groups of mainstream schoolchildren. Performance was assessed across a wide range of spatial tasks including visuo-construction, visuo-spatial memory, visuo-motor, and visuo-perception. The findings indicate a task-specific rather than global deficit in spatial performance in Fragile-X males with visuo-constructive and visuo-motor skills most vulnerable. Molecular analysis of the lymphocyte DNA found minimal evidence for a correlation between CGG expansion size and spatial performance, although tasks with a visuo-perceptual component correlated negatively with expansion size indicating that the further away the number of repeats are from the 200 threshold the poorer the performance.

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