Automatism

Katz, Douglas I.

doi:10.1007/978-0-387-79948-3_442

Douglas I. Katz⁵

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Synonyms

Automatic behavior

Definition

This is a complex movement that occurs without conscious awareness or purposeful intent.

Current Knowledge

Automatisms may occur in the setting of complex-partial seizures. Typical simple movements include lip smacking, chewing, or finger rubbing. More complex automatisms include walking, running, undressing, and speaking. Emotional expressions, such as laughing or crying, may also occur as automatisms. Automatisms may occur during seizures or as post-ictal phenomena. Speech automatisms tend to lateralize to the left hemisphere but lateralization is not predictable for other automatisms (Rasonyi, Fogarasi, Kelemen, Janszky, & Halasz, 2006). Responsiveness is usually lost when automatisms occur during seizures. Rarely, patients may have preserved responsiveness in the presence of seizure-induced automatisms, and only with seizures that arise from right hemisphere foci (Ebner, Dinner, Noachtar, & Luders, 1995).

In addition to epileptic seizures,...

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References and Readings

Ebner, A., Dinner, D. S., Noachtar, S., & Luders, H. (1995). Automatisms with preserved responsiveness: A lateralizing sign in psychomotor seizures. Neurology, 45(1), 61–64.
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Fenwick, P. (1990). Automatism, medicine and the law. Psychological Medicine. Monograph Supplement, 17, 1–27.
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Rasonyi, G., Fogarasi, A., Kelemen, A., Janszky, J., & Halasz, P. (2006). Lateralizing value of postictal automatisms in temporal lobe epilepsy. Epilepsy Research, 70(2–3), 239–243.
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Authors and Affiliations

Boston University School of Medicine Braintree Rehabilitation Hospital, 250 Pond Street, 2184, Boston, MA, USA
Douglas I. Katz

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Douglas I. Katz
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Editors and Affiliations

Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, and Professor of Neurosurgery, and Psychiatry Virginia Commonwealth University – Medical Center Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, VCU, 980542, Richmond, Virginia, 23298-0542, USA
Jeffrey S. Kreutzer
Kessler Foundation Research Center, 1199 Pleasant Valley Way, West Orange, NJ, 07052, USA
John DeLuca
Professor of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, and Neurology and Neuroscience, University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey – New Jersey Medical School, New Jersey, USA
John DeLuca
Independent Practice, 564 M.O.B. East, 100 E. Lancaster Ave., Wynnewood, PA, 19096, USA
Bruce Caplan

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Katz, D.I. (2011). Automatism. In: Kreutzer, J.S., DeLuca, J., Caplan, B. (eds) Encyclopedia of Clinical Neuropsychology. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-79948-3_442

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-79948-3_442
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-79947-6
Online ISBN: 978-0-387-79948-3
eBook Packages: Behavioral Science

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