- University of Poitiers
Roger Gil
Université de Poitiers, Médecine, Emeritus
Having pinpointed the revised meaning given to ‘personal’ moral dilemmas by the neurosciences, these were then compared with impersonal moral dilemmas. So-called personal moral dilemmas are those liable to result in serious harm being... more
Having pinpointed the revised meaning given to ‘personal’ moral dilemmas by the neurosciences, these were then compared with impersonal moral dilemmas. So-called personal moral dilemmas are those liable to result in serious harm being done to a human being, where the subject also clearly feels himself to be the direct agent. They have been the object of scientific studies which confirm that the populations under examination prefer to make deontological choices that are powerfully conditioned by emotion, as opposed to utilitarian choices, underwritten mainly by cognitive strategies. Impersonal moral dilemmas lead more readily to utilitarian choices, mainly involving cognitive strategies. Based on Pilate’s words and behaviour during Jesus’ trial, as these are reported in the four canonical gospels, is it possible to conclude that Pilate was caught up in a moral dilemma; and more precisely, was this a personal or impersonal dilemma? Neuropsychology seeks to deepen the links between types of behaviour and the functioning of the human brain. Although the so-called neurophilosophical trend seeks to take neuropsychology in a materialistic direction, it is a scientific discipline free from any particular metaphysical commitments. The fact that human behaviour might be accompanied by modifications in brain activity need not entail that science confuses the human brain with the human person. This is why neuropsychology should attempt to make a contribution towards the interpretation of the Scriptures.
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Associer reflexion et ethique, est-ce un pleonasme ou une necessite ? L’ethique ne saurait s’enfermer dans des proclamations ni dans des lois meme si elle peut les inspirer. Car l’ethique est d’abord questionnement, problematisation,... more
Associer reflexion et ethique, est-ce un pleonasme ou une necessite ? L’ethique ne saurait s’enfermer dans des proclamations ni dans des lois meme si elle peut les inspirer. Car l’ethique est d’abord questionnement, problematisation, discernement donc reflexion. Elle est a l’articulation meme de la reflexion et des pratiques. Quel sens, dans la polysemie de ce terme, peut-elle donner a nos actions ?
Research Interests: Philosophy and Humanities
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Research Interests: Psychology and Empathy
BACKGROUND: Awake brain surgery allows extensive intraoperative monitoring of not only motor and sensory functions and language but also executive functions. OBJECTIVE: To administer the Stroop test intraoperatively to avoid dramatic side... more
BACKGROUND: Awake brain surgery allows extensive intraoperative monitoring of not only motor and sensory functions and language but also executive functions. OBJECTIVE: To administer the Stroop test intraoperatively to avoid dramatic side effects such as akinetic mutism and to monitor executive functions in an attempt to optimize the benefit/risk balance of surgery. METHODS: A series of 9 adult patients with frontal glioma were operated on for gross tumor resection under local anesthesia. All procedures involved the anterior cingulate cortex (ACC). RESULTS: Three types of response to the Stroop test were observed: 3 patients had a Stroop effect only for stimulation of the contralateral ACC; 3 patients had a Stroop effect for stimulation of the ipsilateral ACC; and 3 patients had no Stroop effect. Preoperative and postoperative neuropsychological and surgical results are presented and discussed. Stimulation sites eliciting a Stroop effect are compared with published image-based data, and insight provided by these surgical data regarding ACC function and plasticity is discussed. No operative complication related to intraoperative administration of the Stroop test was observed. CONCLUSION: Administration of the Stroop test during resection of gliomas involving the ACC in adult patients is an option for intraoperative monitoring of executive functions during awake surgery. Globally, these results suggest functional compensation, mediated by plasticity mechanisms, by contralateral homologous regions of the ACC in adult patients with frontal glioma.
Research Interests: Neuropsychology, Neurosurgery, Consciousness, Medicine, Executive Function, and 15 moreHumans, Glioma, Stroop effect, Female, Male, Clinical Sciences, Wakefulness, Middle Aged, Adult, Stroop test, Neurosciences, Intraoperative Neurophysiological Monitoring, Brain Neoplasms, Anterior cingulate cortex, and Postoperative Complications
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Research Interests: Psychology, Semantics, Audiology, Aphasia, Aging, and 13 moreMedicine, Speech, Memory, Humans, Female, Disease, Male, Clinical Sciences, Aged, Middle Aged, Adult, Alzheimer Disease, and Neurosciences
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Research Interests: Philosophy and Humanities
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Research Interests: Neuroscience, Psychology, Perception, Developmental Biology, Mental Health, and 15 moreBiotechnology, Cancer, Medicine, Multidisciplinary, Distress, Psychological Intervention, Impact, Path Analysis, Cohort, PLoS one, Health Status, Psychological distress, Health perception, Participants, and Predictor
OBJETIVO: Adaptacion y validacion de la primera version en castellano del test Evaluacion Rapida de las Funciones Cognitivas (ERFC) de Gil et al (1986). SUJETOS Y METODOS: Se examino una muestra de 369 personas mayores sin deterioro... more
OBJETIVO: Adaptacion y validacion de la primera version en castellano del test Evaluacion Rapida de las Funciones Cognitivas (ERFC) de Gil et al (1986). SUJETOS Y METODOS: Se examino una muestra de 369 personas mayores sin deterioro mental de tres comunidades autonomas de Espana. Se utilizaron los siguientes instrumentos de evaluacion: ERFC.es (version en castellano del ERFC frances) y versiones espanolas del Mini-Examen Cognoscitivo 30, el test de Ansiedad y Depresion de Goldberg, el Geriatric Mental State, el History and Aetiology Schedule, asi como los criterios de demencia del DSM-IV. Los datos normativos se obtuvieron para tres grupos de edad (63-69, 70-75 y > 75 anos) y cuatro niveles de escolaridad (analfabetos, estudios primarios, bachillerato y estudios universitarios). RESULTADOS: El ERFC.es cumple criterios de fiabilidad test-retest (r = 0,38), validez de contenido (70%), segun la prueba de Morillama por acuerdo entre jueces, validez de constructo (MEC = 0,82 y ERFC = 0,9) y consistencia interna (alfa de Cronbach = 0,8). Obtiene una sensibilidad del 0,92% y una especificidad del 0,86% con el punto de corte de 51/56. Ademas, las puntuaciones totales del ERFC.es son similares al ERFC, una vez eliminados los items nuevos introducidos en nuestra version. Se observa un efecto mayor de las variables edad y nivel escolar en las puntuaciones del ERFC.es que en la version original francesa. CONCLUSIONES: Se confirma la validez y la fiabilidad del ERFC.es en una muestra geriatrica sana. Puede considerarse como un instrumento util para la evaluacion rapida de las capacidades cognitivas.
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Background:Environmental reduplication which is characterized by reduplication of places has been reported in right hemispheric lesions, particularly but not only in the right frontal region. However, spatial delirium may follow right... more
Background:Environmental reduplication which is characterized by reduplication of places has been reported in right hemispheric lesions, particularly but not only in the right frontal region. However, spatial delirium may follow right sub-cortical lesions.Methods:We describe a 53 years-old man who had a reduplicative paramnesia for event alone after an intracerebral haematoma of the right caudate nucleus.Results:MRI Scan showed also an extension of the right caudate nucleus haemorrhage into the ventricular system. Regional cerebral blood flow studied with 99Tcm-HMPAO showed a decrease of perfusion in the right dorso-lateral frontal cortex. To our knowledge, we reported the first case of reduplicative paramnesia of event associated with a right caudate nucleus injury. Similar right frontal deactivation was observed in two cases of reduplicative paramnesia for place, one of them after an infarction of the retro-lenticular portion of the right internal capsulae, the other after a right...
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Research Interests: Psychology, Neuropsychology, Cognition, Medicine, Humans, and 11 moreSaccades, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Reaction Time, Smooth Pursuit, Polysomnography, Adult, Eye Movement, Psychiatric Status Rating Scales, Neuropsychological Tests, Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, and Medical and Health Sciences
: Following a massive infarction in the territory of the right sylvian artery, a right-handed patient with a left hemiplegia and anosognosia, developed a peculiar hypergraphia. It consisted of an inappropriate and permanent writing... more
: Following a massive infarction in the territory of the right sylvian artery, a right-handed patient with a left hemiplegia and anosognosia, developed a peculiar hypergraphia. It consisted of an inappropriate and permanent writing behaviour, disappearing only during sleep. Space-constructional components of writing were severely disturbed. Graphemes were poorly formed. The graphic disturbances were different from hypergraphia previously described in stroke patients who produced linguistically correct but semantically loose writing. They were also different from graphomania reported in a case of fronto-callosal glioma. Our case of anosognosic hypergraphia suggests a sudden loss of inhibition of writing activity of the left hemisphere. The term graphomimia is proposed to distinguish this writing behaviour from the cases of hypergraphia previously reported and from graphomania.
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ABSTRACT In Time Regained (volume 8 of Remembrance of things past), during an afternoon party at the house of the Princesse de Guermantes, Marcel Proust met people he had not seen for a long time. The transformations of faces and features... more
ABSTRACT In Time Regained (volume 8 of Remembrance of things past), during an afternoon party at the house of the Princesse de Guermantes, Marcel Proust met people he had not seen for a long time. The transformations of faces and features linked to old age seem to be a costumed ball and Proust experiences “difficulties in putting the required names to the faces around him” and in recognizing them. “Certainly, some women were recognisable because their faces had remained almost the same and they wore their grey hair to harmonise with the season like autumn leaves. But in others and in some men, their identity was so impossible to establish – for instance between the dark voluptary one remembered and the old monk of now – that their transformation made one think, rather than of the actor's art, of that of the amazing mimic of whom Fregoli remains the prototype”. But a fugitive impression or an effort of memory, abstracting “the natural feature from the travesty”, commonly allows recognition of persons. “One starts with the idea that people have remained the same and one discovers that they have got old. But if one starts by thinking them old, one does not find them so bad”. Despite changes, recognizing people allows one to refer to a past time which is not forgotten. Such is the “regained time”, which, from the past deeply hidden to the present, does tell a life in which we can reach the oldest memories. The course of life is not seen anymore as a decline caused by the wreck of Time. It is seen as an ascending path even if this ascent is also seen as an increase in one's fragility and weakness. Old age, described by Proust, can be interpreted as a permanent identity meaning “selfhood”, beyond changes which only affect “sameness” and preserve the unceasing link of each person with one's past. The human being, so weak in space, withdraws all his contribution to his place in time. This is why Proust is so fascinated by the feeling he has, regarding old age, which proves a permanent self maintaining its identity despite transformations over time, but also on the way to death which will set one free from Time.
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In Parkinson’s disease (PD), apathy (or loss of motivation) is frequent. Nevertheless, the contribution of attentional disorders to its genesis is still not clearly known. We want to determine the relation existing between apathy and... more
In Parkinson’s disease (PD), apathy (or loss of motivation) is frequent. Nevertheless, the contribution of attentional disorders to its genesis is still not clearly known. We want to determine the relation existing between apathy and attentional disorders by using P300a (or novelty P3) as a marker of the attentional process. The study included 25 patients (13 women and 12 men) with PD for whom we have determined the relationship between automatic attention (represented by P300a) and motor status, apathy, executive dysfunction, mental flexibility, inhibitory control, and depression/anxiety. We have found a correlation between the apathy score and amplitude of novelty P300 during the ON period and also a correlation of the apathy score with a decrease in amplitude of P300 during the OFF period. In a linear regression model, changes in the P300a predicted the severity of apathy independently of any other variable. We concluded firstly that the reduction in amplitude of the P300a wave w...
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Research Interests: Psychology, Cognitive Psychology, Semantics, Aging, Semantic Memory, and 15 moreElectroencephalography, Language, Medicine, Semantic relations, Evoked Potentials, Humans, Elderly People, Female, Male, Reaction Time, Aged, Middle Aged, Adult, Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, and Medical and Health Sciences
BackgroundCompulsive checking behaviors are common in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Several authors have suggested that these checking rituals could be related to memory deficits. Our aim was to test whether patients with OCD show... more
BackgroundCompulsive checking behaviors are common in obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). Several authors have suggested that these checking rituals could be related to memory deficits. Our aim was to test whether patients with OCD show working memory impairment in relation to their checking behavior.MethodsWe evaluated the verbal and visuospatial components of patients’ and controls’ working memory using the reading span and backward location span tests. Checking behaviors were measured by recording participants’ eye movements during an image comparison task using a non-invasive, infra-red TOBII 1750 eyetracker. Participants were seated, head-free, in a natural position in front of the eyetracker screen where the images were displayed.ResultsPatients with OCD made more gaze moves to compare images than controls. Both patients’ working memory spans were reduced, and the patients’ deficit in the comparison task was negatively related to their working memory spans.ConclusionsThis wor...
Research Interests: Neuroscience, Attention, Working Memory, Humans, Female, and 14 moreMale, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Eye Movements, Aged, Middle Aged, Adult, Eye Movement, Short Term Memory, Compulsive behavior, Memory Disorders, photic stimulation, Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, european psychiatry, and Medical and Health Sciences
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Self-consciousness (SC) is multifaceted and considered to be the consciousness of one's own mental states. The medial prefrontal cortex may play a critical role in SC. The main aim of this paper was to examine SC in patients with... more
Self-consciousness (SC) is multifaceted and considered to be the consciousness of one's own mental states. The medial prefrontal cortex may play a critical role in SC. The main aim of this paper was to examine SC in patients with behavioral variant frontotemporal dementia, who are characterized more by changes in personal, social, and emotional conduct and loss of insight than by cognitive disturbances. Control and patient groups of 21 subjects each, matched by age, educational level, gender, and nationality were assessed using a SC questionnaire. It measures several aspects: Personal identity, Anosognosia, Affective state, Body representation, Prospective memory, Introspection, and Moral judgments. The most disturbed ones in patients were Anosognosia, Affective state, and Moral judgments, and the least disturbed aspects were awareness of identity and of body representation. No significant correlations were found between the SC score and any clinical or demographical characteris...
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Alexithymia is widely recognized as the inability to identify and express emotions. It is a construct which consists of four cognitive traits such as difficulty in identifying feelings, describing feelings to others, externally oriented... more
Alexithymia is widely recognized as the inability to identify and express emotions. It is a construct which consists of four cognitive traits such as difficulty in identifying feelings, describing feelings to others, externally oriented thinking, and limited imaginative capacity. Several studies have linked alexithymia to cognitive functioning, observing greater alexithymia scores associated with poorer cognitive abilities. Despite Alzheimer’s disease (AD) being a neurodegenerative pathology characterized by cognitive troubles from the early stages, associated to behavioral and emotional disturbances, very few investigations have studied the alexithymia in AD. These studies have shown that alexithymia scores—assessed with Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS)—were greater in AD patients than healthy participants. The objective of the study was to investigate if the alexithymia was present in patients with mild AD. We hypothesized that the AD group would show more alexithymia features than...
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Generalized lockdown caused by COVID-19, necessary yesterday, can no longer be that of tomorrow. It will no longer be possible to cram the humblest into cramped areas, but priority must be given to prevention (certainly with physical... more
Generalized lockdown caused by COVID-19, necessary yesterday, can no longer be that of tomorrow. It will no longer be possible to cram the humblest into cramped areas, but priority must be given to prevention (certainly with physical barriers, hydro-alcoholic gel, face masks), biological diagnosis, isolation, and also the care of any infected person. COVID-19 has hit the most vulnerable first in terms of biological inequality, such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) patients. Those with AD can have sensorial deficits and perception troubles, including visual difficulties and the inability to recognize faces and emotions. Face masks and physical distancing can disrupt facial familiarity and make it more difficult to recognize emotional facial expressions. It can provoke distress, which the visitor can perceive and feel obligated to take off the face mask. This gesture should not be considered as an act of indiscipline, but an act of empathy. Transparent face masks could improve the sufferin...