Recollection training and transfer effects in Alzheimer's disease: effectiveness of the repetition-lag procedure.

This study was designed to extend the use of a memory training technique, known as the repetition-lag procedure, to Alzheimer patients. The specificity of this procedure is to target the process of recollection for improvement.A group of 12 patients were trained individually for 6h. The training procedure consisted of a series of yes/no recognition tasks in which some words were repeated throughout the test list across gradually increasing delays. Their performance was evaluated on pre-and-post tests and compared with a recognition practice group and a no contact control group.Initially, recollection training patients only performed accurately when the delay between repetitions consisted of one intervening word, but by the end of training their performance increased up to four-word intervals. Interestingly, these benefits generalized to other measures of memory, such as working memory, visual memory and source recognition.Effectiveness of the repetition-lag procedure in Alzheimer's disease is discussed.