Poster Session 05 Program Schedule
02/15/2024
02:30 pm - 03:45 pm
Room: Shubert Complex (Posters 1-60)
Poster Session 05: Neuropsychiatry | Addiction/Dependence | Stress/Coping | Emotional/Social Processes
Final Abstract #39
The Impact of Trauma on Attention: Differences in Digit Span Performance among Individuals with Varying Levels of Posttraumatic Stress Symptoms
Daya Grewal, Palo Alto University, Palo Alto, United States
Jennifer Keller, Stanford University, Stanford, United States
Category: Psychiatric Disorders
Keyword 1: post-traumatic stress disorder
Keyword 2: attention
Keyword 3: neuropsychological assessment
Objective:
Individuals seeking neuropsychological assessment often present with inattention symptoms and often have trauma histories. This study examines the relationship between Posttraumatic Stress symptoms measured by the TSI-2 and performance on the WAIS-IV Digit Span.
Participants and Methods:
All participants had experienced trauma over the course of their life. Participants (n = 59) were classified into two groups based on the PTSD factor score: control group (n = 35, T score < 60), indicating no major PTSD symptoms, and a PTSD group, those with mild to severe PTSD symptoms (n = 24, T scores > 60).
Results:
A one-way ANOVA indicated that overall the control group significantly outperformed the PTSD group on the digit span test, F(1, 57) = 9.438, p = .003. In examining the subtests, the control group performed better on all tasks, including digit span forward (p=.017), backward (p=.002), and sequencing (p=.05).
Conclusions:
The symptomatic group performed lower on all subtests suggesting poorer simple and complex attention, as well as reduced working memory. The results align with existing literature that indicates individuals diagnosed with PTSD exhibit notable impairments in concentration, attention, and working memory. These deficits may be attributed to trauma, and such trauma needs to be considered when one is conducting a neuropsychological evaluation.
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