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On the dissimilar effects of drugs on the digit symbol substitution and continuous performance tests

A review and preliminary integration of behavioral and physiological evidence

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Summary

A tentative hypothesis is presented to account for the dissociation of the effects of various centrally-acting drugs and other agents on performance of the Continuous Performance Test (C.P.T.) and the Digit Symbol Substitution Test (D.S.S.T.): L.S.D., secobarbital, pentobarbital meprobamate and phenobarbital produced significantly greater impairment of the D.S.S.T. than of the C.P.T., while chlorpromazine, sleep deprivation and centrencephalic epilepsy had the reverse effect. Psychological, neurophysiological, electroencephalographic and neuropharmacological data were cited which suggested that the tests were affected differently because they are dependent upon the functioning of somewhat different neural organizations which are, in turn, differentially sensitive to the action of various centrally-active agents.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Psychiatry and the Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Boston University School of Medicine Boston University Medical Center, USA

    Allan F. Mirsky & Conan Kornetsky

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  1. Allan F. Mirsky
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  2. Conan Kornetsky
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Additional information

The studies referred to in this paper involving the Digit Symbol Substitution and Continuous Performance Tests were conducted in the Laboratory of Clinical Science, and in the Section on Neuropsychology, Laboratory of Psychology, National Institute of Mental Health, and in the Surgical Neurology Branch of the National Institute of Neurological Diseases and Blindness. The authors wish to express their appreciation to the numerous members of the staff of these laboratories who provided advice, assistance and facilities for these studies. Part of the costs of preparing this work for publication were borne by grant M-6015 from the National Science Foundation, grants GMK3-1759 and K3-14 915 from the National Institute of Mental Health and grant 61-241 from the Foundations Fund for Research in Psychiatry.

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Mirsky, A.F., Kornetsky, C. On the dissimilar effects of drugs on the digit symbol substitution and continuous performance tests. Psychopharmacologia 5, 161–177 (1964). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00413239

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