Type-1 diabetes shapes working memory processing strategies.

Background: Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is a metabolic disorder characterized by recurrent hypo- and hyperglycemic episodes, whose clinical development has been associated with cognitive and working memory (WM) deficits.

Objective: To contrast quantitative electroencephalography (qEEG) measures between young patients with T1D and healthy controls while performing a visuospatial WM task with two memory load levels and facial emotional stimuli.

Methods: Four or five neutral or happy faces were sequentially and pseudo-randomly presented in different spatial locations, followed by subsequent sequences displaying the reversed spatial order or any other. Participants were instructed to discriminate between these two alternatives during EEG recording.

Results: A significant increase in the absolute power of the delta and theta bands, distributed mainly over the frontal region was found during task execution, with a slight decrease of alpha band power in both groups but mainly in control individuals. However, these changes were more pronounced in the T1D patients, and reached their maximum level during the WM encoding phase, even on trials with the lower memory load. In contrast, changes seemed to occur more gradually in controls and results differed significantly only on the trials with the higher WM load.

Conclusions: These results reflect adaptive WM-processing mechanisms in which cognitive strategies have evolved in T1D patients in order to meet task demands.