Glossary

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Abstraction: Considered higher-order functioning. Ability to draw parallels of an unrelated concept to a specific situation or idea.
Acalculia: Disturbance in the ability to perform simple or complex arithmetic problems.
ACE Inhibitor: Angitensin Converting Enzyme Inhibitor. Drugs used mainly for the treatment of heart disease and high blood pressure.
Acetylcholine: Neurotransmitter within the body believed to be involved in memory functioning.
Acquisition: The process by which the brain develops a code after exposure to information to be remembered. This becomes a record of the experience.
Acuity: Sharpness of a stimulus.
Acute: The sudden onset of a crucial disease process.
Adiadokokinesia: Inability to stop a motor movement and initiate a movement in the opposite direction.
Affect: The observable mood or emotional state of an individual.
Ageism: Term used to describe the overt and covert discrimination of the elderly.
Agnosia: Inability to recognize various objects by perception of the senses.
Agrammatism: Inability to arrange words in grammatical sequence or to form an intelligible sentence.
Agraphia/Dysgraphia: Disturbance in writing intelligible words.
Ahylognosia: The inability to differentiate qualities of materials such as weight or texture.
Akathisia: Restless leg syndrome.
Akinesia: Partial loss or reduction of voluntary movement.
Alexia/Dyslexia: Reading impairment.
Alexithymia: Inability to identify or describe feelings.
Alternating attention (Attention switching): The ability to switch from one stimulus to another.
Ambivalence: Refers to the coexistence of polarized or opposite feelings toward a situation or object. Involves the use of the unconscious to hold the conflicting emotion temporarily at bay. Dynamic psychotherapeutic models view this as a potential cause of anxiety and internal conflict.
Amnesia: Loss of memory about the events within a distinct period of time.
Amusia: Defect in the perception of music.
Analgesic: Pain medication.
Anemia: Condition caused by decreased red blood cell count.
Aneurysm: A deformity in the wall of an artery that can result in a hemorrhage.
Anomia: Difficulty in finding the correct word for a person, place, or thing.
Anosmia: Loss of the ability to smell.
Anosodiaphoria: An unconcern for one’s paralysis.
Anosognosia: A severe neglect in which the person fails to recognize his deficit.
Anoxia: Lack of oxygen to the brain resulting in cell damage.
Anterograde amnesia: Difficulty in learning new information and in consolidating information about continuing events.
Anticholinergic: Medications used to block the activity of acetylcholine. Acetylcholine is responsible for many activities within the nervous system and is one of the key neurotransmitters involved in memory. Side effects of anticholinergics often involve short-term memory deficits and confusion.
Anticoagulation: Thinning of the blood. Preventing blood clots from forming by slowing down the clotting process. Coumadin and heparin are two common drugs used as blood thinners.
Anticonvulsant: Medication used to reduce the possibility of a seizure. Common anticonvulsants include: Tegretol, Dilantin, Mysoline, and phenobarbital.
Antidepressant (Thymoleptic): Medications used to treat the symptoms of depression. Three major classifications include:
Antiparkinson drugs: Drug used to treat the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease.
Apallic Syndrome: Disease process marked by diffuse bilateral degeneration of the cerebral cortex with spared subcortical function.
Apathy: Disinterested and unconcerned attitude often seen in dementia and depression.
Aphasia/Dysphasia: Inability to use language to communicate and/or comprehend due to brain cell damage. Impairment in speech.
- Dysphasia is a milder form of aphasia. Receptive aphasia is impairment in the comprehension of speech. Expressive aphasia is difficulty in verbally expressing oneself.
Aphasia: expressive: Inability to express oneself verbally, while knowing what one wants to communicate.
Aphasia: fluent: Use of language at a normal rate of speed that has limited meaning.
Aphasia: global: Limited or no ability to comprehend or produce communication.
Aphasia: nonfluent: Mostly intact comprehension marked by poor expressive ability. Usually characterized by broken speech and impoverished articulation.
Aphasia: receptive: Difficulty grasping what others express.
Aphemia: Solitary loss of articulation or ability to express oneself in speech while maintaining ability to write or understand spoken language (expressive aphasia).
Apractognosia: Disorder that consists of several apraxic and agnostic syndromes stemming from an impairment of spatial perception.
Apraxia: Inability to perform single intentional motor movements that is not due to the loss of coordination, motor control, or sensation. Dyspraxia refers to limited ability to carry out movement.
Apraxia Constructional: Inability to reproduce geometrical shapes or assemble simple puzzles.
Apraxia ideomotor: Inability to perform intentional motor movement due to a breakdown in the ability to coordinate instructions from previous movements.
Arousal: State of alertness governed by the reticular activating system. The reticular activating system is located in the brain stem and extends from the medulla to the thalamus.
Art therapy: Development of motors skills, creativity, perceptual abilities, and self-esteem through artwork.
Articulation: Use of the lips, tongue, teeth, and palate to form words.
Aspiration: Food or fluid in the lungs.
Associated reaction: The secondary unintentional movement that follows another intentional movement.
Association: Your mind stores memory in a series of associations that are tied together in a logical manner. Association serves as a trigger that stimulates the retrieval of the specific memory needed. Association can be used as a tool in both recall and encoding.
Astereognosia (Tactile Agnosia): Inability to recognize objects through the sense of touch.
Asymbolia: Inability to use or comprehend words, gestures and/or other types of symbols.
Ataxia: Uncoordinated voluntary muscle movements due to damage within the cerebellum or basal ganglia. Other movement disorders are usually ruled out before this diagnosis is given.
Atrophy: A wasting away of a portion of the body (for instance, muscles, organs) due to inactivity, lack of nutrition, or nerve damage.
Attention: Purposeful focus of sensory system(s) toward a stimulus.
Attention alternating: Purposeful focus of attention from one stimulus to another.
Attention span: The amount of time one is able to focus attention.
Attention-sustained: Continual focus of attention on one stimulus; concentration.
Attentional capacity: The ability to focus and control attention.
Auditory agnosia: Inability to recognize differences in sound that is not due to a hearing impairment.
Autotopagnosia: Impairment in the recognition of body parts. A defect in the comprehension of body scheme.
Awareness: Ability to perceive internal and external stimuli.
Balance: Ability to maintain upright position through continual adjustment of movement and equilibrium signals.
Barbiturate: A medication that causes a hypnotic state or state of drowsiness. Can have effects on memory functioning.
Belief system: Internalized views of self, others, and the environment. Consists of feelings, thoughts, and behaviors.
Benzodiazepines: Class of medications used for the treatment of seizures and anxiety. Side effects include depression, confusion, memory deficits, and impaired coordination.
Beta-amyloid: Toxic substance found in brain plaques. Usually associated with Alzheimer’s disease. It is believed that a defect in the regulating action of some enzymes (lysosomal proteases) may be responsible for the release of beta-amyloid.
Beta-blocker: Heart medication mainly used for the treatment of high blood pressure. The mechanism of action results in dilated blood vessels and slowed heart rate.
Bilateral: Occurring on both sides of the body.
Body image: Internal representation of one’s body that focuses more on one’s feelings and thoughts of one’s body rather than the actual structure.
Body scheme: A postural model of one’s body. Believed to be the basis of motor functions as it relates to how one perceives the position of the body and the relationship of body parts.
Bradykinesia: Slowing in the execution of motor movements.
Brain dead: Permanent loss of all levels of brain functioning.
Brain injury: Damage to the brain that results in loss of one or more functions. Classified as mild, moderate, and severe.
Brain injury acquired: Impairment in cognitive functioning due to the sustainment of head injury.
Brain injury closed: Tissue damage within the brain resulting from the collision of the head with another object.
Brain injury: penetrating: Impairment in brain functioning due to direct damage of brain tissue from an object.
Brain injury: traumatic: Damage to brain tissue due to an incident of injury.
Brain plasticity: The ability of the undamaged portion of the brain to assume functions of the damaged portion.
Brain scan: Imaging of the brain after injection of a radioactive dye.
Bronchodilator: Medication that opens the bronchial tubes of the lungs.
Calcium channel blocker: Medication used in the treatment of high blood ressure.
Cerebral angiography: Medical procedure where dye is injected into an artery so that the vascular system can be examined through X-ray.
Cerebral compression: The compression of brain tissue due to swelling, hematoma, tumor, or aneurysm.
Cerebral hemorrhage: Massive bleeding into the brain.
Cerebral infarct: Death of a region of the brain due to significantly diminished blood supply.
Cerebral spinal fluid: Fluid within the CNS.
Cerebral vascular accident (CVA): Commonly referred to as stroke. Destruction of brain tissue due to a lack of blood flow due to bleeding or blockage.
Cholesterol: Fatty substance found throughout the body. Sustained high levels result in hardening of the arteries and other cardiovascular diseases and subsequent memory deficits.
Chorea (Choreiform movements): Asynchronous, irregular movements that appear to proceed semipurposively from one part of the body to another.
Chronic: Disease process of long duration.
Chunking: A mnemonic technique where several pieces of related information are placed in a central concept for ease in remembering.
Cognitive flexibility: The ability to see things from different perspectives and to remain flexible in thinking.
Cognitive theory of memory: Surmises memory functioning to be like a computer. The mind accepts input through perception, stores it in memory, processes it through thought, and acts on it in reaching decisions.
Cogwheel rigidity: Continual rhythmical interruption of passive movement, slight catch with each movement.
Color agnosia: Inability to recognize differences in color.
Competence: mental: Refers to an individual’s ability to handle personal affairs. Having adequate mental abilities for daily functioning.
Congestive heart failure: Inadequate pumping of the heart resulting in fluid accumulation in body tissues.
Copy theory: One of the oldest known theories pertaining to memory which dates back to ancient Greek philosophers. We perceive an object, which creates a mental copy in our minds.
Connectionism: Belief that theories of the mind and memory should be based on the study of the brain’s actual functioning.
Constructional apraxia: Inability to copy designs in two or three dimensions.
Cortex: Outer layer of the brain. Alzheimer’s disease usually affects the cortex.
Corticosteroids: Medications used for their anti-inflammatory property.
Circumlocution: Use of another word or phrase in place of a word that cannot be remembered.
Clonus: Series of rhythmic jerks following the stretching of a muscle.
Declarative memory: Portion of long-term memory that stores factual information.
Delayed recall: The ability to remember information after a sustained period of time.
Delirium: Sudden onset of symptoms that include confusion, fluctuating levels of consciousness, and disorientation. Delirium is often reversible.
Delusions: Firmly held false beliefs despite evidence to the contrary.
Dementia: A cognitive impairment or loss of mental ability, particularly related to deficits in memory. Also includes impairment in speech, judgment, thought, and personality changes. A classification for as many as sixty etiologies.
Demyelination: The loss of the protective coating (myelin) on nerve fibers that act to speed up nerve impulses.
Depth of processing model of memory: Concept supported by Craik and Lockhart (1972). This concept purports that effective memory is contingent upon the kinds of operations carried out while encoding information, and that retention is determined by the characteristics that are emphasized during the initial encoding process. According to this model, information that is encoded in a more personally meaningful way is more likely to be recalled.
Diabetes mellitus: Disease in which the pancreas is unable to produce insulin resulting in the improper processing of sugar. Can lead to memory deficits among other medical complications.
Distractibility: Difficulty in sustaining attention due to the interference of another stimulus.
Diuretic: Commonly referred to as a water pill. Medication that assists the kidneys in ridding the body of salt and water.
Divided attention: The ability to perform or attend to two different tasks simultaneously.
DREAM: Developing Rational and Emotional Adaptive Mindsets.
Dressing Apraxia: Inability to dress oneself due to a disorder in body scheme or motor planning.
Dysarthria: Impairment in speech marked by weakness or slowness of speech musculature.
Dysdiadochokinesia: Impairment of simple alternating movements such as touching fingers and thumb sequentially. Results from damage to the cerebellum.
Dysgraphia: Impaired ability to write. Agraphia is the inability to write.
Edema: Accumulation of fluid in the body that results in swelling.
Elaboration: The level of processing involved with learning information.
Electroencephalography (EEG): Measure of electrical activity of the brain taken from surface electrodes on the scalp.
Embolism: A clot or other obstruction that is carried from a larger vessel into a smaller one. It obstructs the circulation of blood and results in damaged brain tissue. A thrombosis is a formed clot that remains at the point at which it formed.
Emphysema: Swelling of the alveoli in the lungs resulting in difficulty in breathing.
Encoding: Process of learning.
Envision: Principle that guides the teaching of visual imagery. Relates to the process of elaboration during encoding. It incorporates all of the senses, not just vision.
Enzyme: Chemical within the body that acts to speed up other chemical reactions.
Episodic memory: Information about particular memories associated with the time and place that you learned the information. Traumatic memories are stored in this form.
Essential tremor: Tremor that is inherited and usually postural in nature.
Etiology: Cause of a disease or condition.
Explicit memory: Conscious retrieval of memory resulting in recollection of data from the past.
Figure ground: Refers to the foreground and the background. Impairment entails the inability to distinguish the two.
Finger agnosia: One’s inability to distinguish one’s own fingers.
Form constancy: Ability to attend to subtle variations in form.
Generalization: The ability to transfer knowledge learned in one context to other contexts.
Gerstmann syndrome: Syndrome derived from a lesion in the dominant hemisphere that includes dysgraphia, finger agnosia, right/left discrimination, and dyscalculia.
Glaucoma: Visual degenerative disease whereby abnormally high pressure builds up inside the eyes. Results in permanent impairment if not treated.
Guided affective imagery: A waking dream technique in psychotherapy, used in brief therapy and group therapy.
Heart block: Disease where the heart’s electrical conduction system becomes disrupted resulting in abnormal heartbeat.
Hemianopsia: Visual field deficits that involve blindness in one half of the visual field.
Hemiparesis (Hemiplegia): Paralysis of one side of the body.
Histamine: Chemical within the body associated with allergic reactions. Produces many changes within the body including: decreased blood pressure, increased secretions from salivary glands and stomach, dilation of small blood vessels, swelling, and itching. Histamine blockers are a group of medications used primarily to treat allergic reactions. They have also been studied for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.
Homonymous hemianopsia: Blindness in right or left visual field in both eyes.
Hormone: Chemical produced within a gland that travels within the bloodstream to affect another part of the body.
Hygiene: The science, conditions, and practices that serve to promote or preserve health.
Hypertension: High blood pressure.
Hypokinesia: Slowing in the initiation of movements.
Hypothermia: A condition that results from overexposure to cold temperatures that can result in memory deterioration.
Ideational apraxia: Inability to carry out automatic activities even when the concept of the task is understood.
Ideomotor apraxia: Inability to initiate gestures or perform purposeful motor tasks even though the task is understood.
Implicit memory: Memory that comes to mind or influences one’s behavior even though there is no conscious recollection.
Infection: Disease that is the result of a microorganism within the body. Bacterial infections are often treated with antibiotics. Viral infections are not as treatable by medications. Viral infections include: a cold, flu, AIDS.
Insight: Person’s awareness of his or her problem.
Interactive imagery: Consists of a mental picture that is vivid and distinctive with at least two objects interconnected in some way.
Lateral: Occurring on one side of the body.
Learning: The ability to change behavior to adapt to the environment. Change in an individual’s perceptions due to experience. Closely linked to memory.
Long-term memory: What most people call memory. It is the stored, permanent information that we have committed to memory to be retrieved and used later.
Long-term register: Equivalent to long-term memory. Where information is stored then retrieved, updated, and restored as necessary.
Macrosomatognosia: Perception of one’s body as very large due to a disorder in the body scheme.
Metamorphopsia: Visual distortion of objects even though objects are accurately recognized. Often associated with a lesion in the parietal lobe.
Microsomatognosia: Perception of one’s body as very small due to a disorder in the body scheme.
Memory: The process of taking information from one’s environment through the senses and organizing and storing this information in the form of representations. Also the ability to recall these representations at a later time.
Memory auditory: The ability to recall a series of number, names, words, etc., presented orally. An individual with an auditory memory impairment may need constant reminders of instructions presented orally.
Memory delayed: Recall of information after a set delay of time, typically ten minutes or more. Typically tested with an interference presented during the waiting period to prevent rehearsal.
Memory episodic: Memory of events in a person’s life. Typically stored and recalled according to time. Usually more vulnerable to injury than semantic memory probably due to minimal opportunities for rehearsal.
Memory fund of information: An estimation of the amount of information that an individual retains about their past.
Memory immediate: The ability to recall information immediately after presentation. Tied directly to attention.
Memory long-term: Refers to the ability to recall information thirty minutes or more after presentation. Requires storage and retrieval of information.
Memory remote: Information that a person is able to recall about the past. When referring to injury, it usually refers to information that the individual can recall prior to injury. Information from delayed memory becomes remote memory after several months.
Memory semantic: Learned factual information usually encoded through repetition.
Memory short-term: Also referred to as working memory. Amount of limited information that an individual can hold in conscious awareness. Usually limited to several minutes and seven to nine bits of information.
Memory spot: Central location to place daily used items such as keys, wallet, etc.
Memory visual: The ability to store and recall pictures, figures, and text via the input of information through visuo-perceptual channels. Information may be encoded using auditory or visual representations independent of the mode of presentation.
Mental capacity: Amount of information that an individual can process in a given period of time.
Mental disability: A general concept referring to a disabling mental condition due to injury, illness, severe emotional disorder, or mental retardation.
Metamemory: Pertains to self-knowledge and self-perceptions about memory.
Method of loci technique: Consists of remembering things by visually placing what you want to remember in set places that are familiar to you.
Mnemonic: Specific techniques and tips used to improve memory functioning.
Motor apraxia: Loss of motor memory patterns resulting in loss of purposeful movement.
Movement tremor: Tremor that occurs during purposeful movement. If it occurs during the initiation of movement it is referred to as an initial tremor. If the tremor occurs during the movement it is referred to as a transitional tremor. If the tremor occurs during the end of a movement it is referred to as terminal tremor.
Multi-infarct dementia: Dementia caused by a series of strokes.
Myasthenia gravis: Chronic condition that often ends in general weakness and paralysis.
Myoclonus: Brief repetitive muscle contractions stemming from the CNS.
Narcotic: Addictive medication used for the treatment of pain. Side effects include cognitive slowing and memory impairment.
Nativism: Originated with Plato. Belief that knowledge is innate and present at birth. Opposite of the tabula rasa belief that we are born as “blank slates” and knowledge is accumulated throughout our life span.
Nervous system: Includes the brain, spinal cord, and nerves in the body.
Neurological imaging: Techniques used to obtain images of the brain and spinal cord. Two most common procedures are computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Others include: single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET).
Neurotransmitters: Chemical substances in the brain that conduct electrical impulses from one cell to another.
New Agers: Term given to older adults who are currently defining new roles for the aged.
Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAID): Class of medications that include aspirin and ibuprofen used to treat pain and swelling. Currently being studied for the treatment and management of progressive dementias such as Alzheimer’s disease.
Oculomotor deficits: Defect in the voluntary movement of the eyes or in the ability to gaze from side to side or upward and downward.
Paralalia: A speech deficit. Usually involves the production of a sound different than the one desired.
Paraphasia: Replacement of one word for another because the desired word cannot be remembered.
Parkinson’s disease: Progressive nervous system disorder that results in uncoordinated motor movements, tremors, lack of facial expression, rigidity of muscles, and difficulty walking. Parkinson’s disease is different from parkinsonism, which results in only a portion of the above symptoms and is often caused by the side effects of medications or drugs.
Perception: Ability to accurately interpret internal and external sensory information.
Pica: Eating nonfood substances. Often seen in later stages of dementia.
Planotopokinesia: Disorganization of discriminative spatial judgment.
Prosopagnosia: Inability to recognize faces and distinguish differences in faces.
Postural abnormalities: Stooped posture, stiffness.
PQRST: Stands for “preview,” “question,” “read,” “summarize,” and “test.” Used as a way to rehearse and organize information and enhance attention skills (Sandman 1993).
Preparatory set: A mental warm-up, preparing yourself and your mind for the specific abilities needed in an upcoming situation. Mentally rehearsing in your head all the activities, demands, and potential difficulties that may occur in an impending situation.
Preparatory review: The act of taking a step back from a demanding task in order to review and adjust your performance. It’s much the same as a preparatory set, except you’re taking the time to do it after you’ve already started a task. It’s a mental pit stop. It helps prevent confusion and frustration.
Procedural memory: Portion of long-term memory that stores information on how to do something.
Pseudo dementia: Dementia symptoms that are caused by the onset of depression and which are almost always reversible.
Psychosis: Mental illness in which the person suffers from disordered thinking, bizarre behavior, hallucinations, illusions, and/or delusions.
RARE: Relaxation, Attention, Rehearsal, and visual imagery (Envision).
Recall: Ability to retrieve information previously stored in memory.
Recognition: Ability to retrieve information previously stored in memory with the aid of a reminder.
Rehearsal: Viewed as a method to sustain information in the working memory long enough for the information to be encoded. Process of repeating information to be remembered.* Resting tremor: Tremor involving several muscle groups that is apparent during rest but tends to disappear during purposeful movement.
Retention: The capacity to remember. Rehearsal is one of the most important factors involved in retaining the information that we have been exposed to.
Retrieval: Obtaining information that has been stored in long-term memory. Once the information is successfully stored, it must be retrievable in order to be useful. For information to be retrieved it first must be stored effectively. Retrieval cues and reminders can help in this process.
Retropulsion: Tendency to fall backwards when walking.
Search: The ability to find a particular stimulus within the context of similar stimuli.
Secondary memory: Memory that was recently converted to long-term memory.
Selective attention: The ability to attend to one stimulus while blocking out another.
Semantic memory: All the general information that we have accumulated in our long-term memories. Semantic memory can be further broken down into declarative memory and procedural memory. Declarative memory stores information about facts (like who, what, when, where). Procedural memory stores information on how to do something (e.g., how to change the spark plugs in your car).
Sensory filters: Interface between senses and memory. Point at which information is taken from the environment through sight, smell, taste, touch, or sound.
Serotonin: Neurotransmitter in the body and the brain that is believed to be partially responsible for the regulation of mood.
Schizophrenia: Mental disorder that results in psychosis, delusions, hallucinations, and a general breakdown in reality perception.
Short-term memory store: Interface between sensory filters and long-term memory. Enables one to encode the information whereupon it is stored in the long-term register.
Somatic complaints: Physical symptoms such as headache, gastrointestinal discomfort, pains, and dizziness that may be attributable to emotional discomfort.
Somatotopagnosia: Unawareness of body structure and failure to recognize parts of the body and their relationship to each other.
Statins: Class of medications used to treat high cholesterol. These include: Mevacor, Lescol, and Zocor. These medications have been identified as possibly causing memory impairment.
Subcortical dementia: Dementia that is caused by abnormalities in the brain below the cortex. Alzheimer’s disease is usually associated with the cortex. Parkinson’s disease is usually subcortical. Symptoms included in subcortical dementias are: movement disorders, cognitive slowing, executive dysfunction, memory impairment, mood and personality changes.
Sun downing: Increased agitation and disruptive behaviors in dementia patients during the evening and early night.
Sustained attention (concentration): The application of mental effort in a purposeful, sustained manner.
Syncope: Fainting spells usually caused by transient cerebral ischemia due to circulatory insufficiency to the brain.
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE): Commonly referred to as lupus. Chronic, progressive disease marked by disruptions to multiple organs and blood vessels, skin irritation, and arthritis. Often results in intermittent impaired cognitive functioning.
Tactile agnosia: Inability to recognize objects by touch even though peripheral sensory nerves remain intact.
Tardive dyskinesia: Condition usually caused by the long-term side effects of antipsychotic medications that results in continued involuntary movements of the mouth, tongue, and other muscle groups within the body.
Tertiary memory: Long-term memory of the distant past. This memory is the last to be affected by Alzheimer’s disease and is rarely affected by depression.
Thyroid: Large gland in the neck that serves to regulate body growth through secretion of thyroxine. Thyroid disorders can result in hyperthyroidism or hypothyroidism and can result in disturbances in mood and memory, among other disorders.
Tic: Repetitive, sudden, transient, and stereotyped movements with a limited distribution. Prolonged tics are referred to as “dystonic.”
Transient ischemic attacks: Often referred to as “mini-strokes.” Usually of rapid onset and brief duration. Due to temporary insufficient blood supply to the brain.
Tremor: Rhythmic and repetitive movements of a body part. Resting tremor is one occurring at rest; action (kinetic or intention) tremor occurs during movement; postural tremor is observed when the affected body part is voluntarily held against gravity.
Unilateral body agnosia: Neglect of the left side of the body.
Unilateral neglect: Inability to integrate or use sensory information from the left side of the body.
Unilateral spatial agnosia: Neglect of the left side of visual space.
Verbal apraxia: Difficulty in forming and organizing intelligible words although the musculature structure within the face and head remains intact.
Vigilance: The ability to detect rarely occurring signals over a prolonged period of time.
Visual objective agnosia: Inability to recognize objects.
Visual spatial agnosia: Deficit in perceiving spatial relations between objects or in relation to self.
Working memory: Contains all that we are conscious of and working on right now. Other terms associated with working memory include: immediate, active, or primary memory.