Brain Areas Involved in Sound and Spoken Word Memory

Stopped early

Conditions studied: Brain Mapping, Language Disorder, Adult, Healthy, Memory Disorder

In brief

Background: \- Studies have shown that animals such as monkeys and dogs have excellent sight and touch memory but perform poorly on sound memory tasks. Human brains have certain areas that are important for speaking and understanding language. These areas may be involved in sound and spoken word memory. Researchers want to study these areas of the brain to find out if the memory for sounds requires brain structures that are usually associated with language learning and are unique to humans. Objectives: \- To use magnetic resonance imaging to study areas of the brain involved in sound memory. Eligibility: \- Healthy right-handed volunteers between 18 and 50 years of age. They must be native English speakers and have completed high school. Design: * The study requires a screening visit and 1 or 2 study visits to the National Institutes of Health Clinical Center. * At the screening visit, volunteers will have a medical history taken. They will also have physical and neurological exams, and complete a questionnaire. Women of childbearing age will give a urine sample. Participants who have not had a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scan in the past year will have one at this visit. * At the second visit, participants will have tests of sound memory. They will listen to a set of nonsense words spoken through earphones and memorize the words. Then they will listen to the words again to judge if the words were part of the earlier list. Participants will have a 1 hour break, then do the sound memory test again. During the second test they will have repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS), which stimulates different regions of the brain. * If the group results from the testing sessions are positive, there will be a third visit. At this visit, participants will have a sound perception test. They will listen to words spoken through earphones and judge whether the words in the pair are the same or different. Participants will have rTMS during these tests as well.

Key facts

Study ID: NCT01375595
Run by: National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
People needed: 45
Starts: 2011-05-26
Expected to finish: 2015-10-30
Last updated by the study team: 2017-07-02

Who can join

Age: 18 and older, up to 40. Sex: any. Healthy volunteers: accepted.

You may not qualify if…

Participants will be excluded from this research study if they:
Are taking medications that include antidepressants, anxiolytics, anticonvulsants, antipsychotics, antiparkinson, hypnotics, stimulants, and/or antihistamines
Have a diagnosed neurologic or psychiatric condition
Have a history of seizure disorder
Have implanted devices such as pacemakers, medication pumps, or defibrillators, metal in the cranium except the mouth, intracardiac lines, history of shrapnel injury or any other condition/device that may contraindicate or preclude the acquisition of MRI
Have severe back pain or any other condition which might prevent them from lying flat for up to 1 hour
Have Claustrophobia (a fear of tight spaces), which prevents them from lying still in a tight or small space for up to 1 hour
Are currently pregnant
Have known hearing loss
Have an alcohol or substance abuse problem as determined by the screening we will do

Where it is running

National Institutes of Health Clinical Center, 9000 Rockville Pike — Bethesda, Maryland, United States

Full record on ClinicalTrials.gov

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