Effect of parental family history of Alzheimer’s disease on serial position profiles

Background—An exaggerated recency effect (i.e., disproportionate recall of last-presented items) has been consistently observed in the word list learning of patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Our study sought to determine if there were similar alterations in serial position learning among asymptomatic persons at risk for AD due to parental family history. Methods—Subjects included 623 asymptomatic middle-aged children of patients with AD (median = 53 years) and 157 control participants whose parents survived to at least age 70 without AD or other memory disorders. All participants were administered the Rey Auditory Verbal Learning Test which requires learning and recall of 15 unrelated nouns. Results—There was no significant difference in total words recalled between the AD children and control groups. However, compared to controls, AD children showed a significantly greater tendency to recall words from the end (recency) versus beginning (primacy) of the list. Serial position effects were unrelated to apolipoprotein allele epsilon 4 (APOE ε4) or depressive symptoms. Conclusions—Asymptomatic persons at risk for AD by virtue of family history do not show a difference in total words recalled compared to controls, but exhibit a distinctly different serial positio