Aim. Bipolar disorder (BD) significantly affects level of cognitive and motor functioning.
Studies on cognitive function in BD shows i.a. deficits in visuospatial processing and
visuospatial memory. However, studies have not used Mental Rotation Task to evaluate these
functions so far. Our aim is to introduce this method to assess abovementioned deficits in
euthymic BD patients.
Method. 31 euthymic BD patients and 27 healthy volunteers matched for age and years
of education were recruited. All participants performed digital version of Mental Rotation
Task. In this task, participants were asked to compare two figures rotated against each other
and declare its similarity or difference indicating whether the figures are identical or whether
they constitute their own mirror image..
Results. The test revealed significantly longer reaction times in the group of BD patients
when images were rotated by – 90, – 45, 45, 90 degrees, or not rotated at all. There was no
significant difference in condition of – 135, 135 or 180 degrees. The accuracy rate was significantly
lower in the patient group than in the control group for the entire test and in each condition. The correlation between the average response time and the accuracy rate turned
out to be insignificant.
Conclusions. Our results are consistent with studies presenting visuospatial deficits in
bipolar disorder. In this study we show for the first time that mental rotation deficits are present
in euthymic state of BD patients.
keywords in Polish:
przetwarzanie wzrokowo-przestrzenne, choroby afektywne, PEBL