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Division of Clinical Neuropsychology
Newsletter 40
American Psychological Association
Volume 14, Number 3 1996
DIVISION 40 OFFICERS AND COMMITTEE CHAIRS
AUGUST 1996-AUGUST 1997
PRESIDENT-EILEEN B. FENNELL, PHD
PRESIDENT-ELECT-LINAS BIELAUSKAS, PHD
PAST-PRESIDENT-KENNETH M. ADAMS, PHD
SECRETARY-ANN C. MARCOTTE, PHD
TREASURER-WILDRED G. VANGORP, PHD
MEMBERS-AT-LARGE-
RICHARD BERG, PHD
JILL S. FISCHER, PHD
KERRY HAMSHER, PHD
COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVES-
GERALD GOLDSTEIN, PHD
ANTONIO PUENTE, PHD
THOMAS J. BOLL, PHD
COMMITTEE CHAIRS (STANDING COMMITEES)
FELLOWS-STAN BERENT, PHD
MEMBERSHIP-WILLIAM B. MENEESE, PHD
ELECTIONS-KENNETH M. ADAMS, PHD
PROGRAM-KEITH YEATES, PHD
MARK BONDI, PHD
COMMITEE HEADS (AD HOC COMMITTEES/TASK FORCES)
SCIENCE ADVISORY-ANN C. MARCOTTE, PHD
EDUCATION ADVISORY-BRUCE CROSSON, PHD
PRACTICE ADVISORY-JOSEPH D. EUBANKS, PHD
PUBLIC INTEREST ADVISORY-(currently vacant)
ETHICS-BRUCE BECKER, PHD
MINORITY AFFAIRS-TONY L. STRICKLAND, PHD
NEWSLETTER-JOHN DE LUCA, PHD
TRAINING PROGRAMS DATA BANK-LLOYD CRIPE, PHD
HECAEN AWARD-KERRY HAMSHER, PHD
BENTON, LEVITT AWARDS-IDA SUE BARON, PHD
INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS-ROBERT HEILBRONNER,PHD
CPT CODE-ANTONIO PUENTE, PHD
NELSON BUTTERS REMEMBERED
Nelson Butters
May 16.1993
MEMOIRS
I am going to begin tonight a series of recordings dealing with various aspects of my career.
On March 11 of this year, 1993, I received the diagnosis of ALS. Not only do I have ALS but I have the bulbar form, which is clearly affecting my ability to talk. I am making these recordings now while I still have some speech left and I can express my thoughts on a number of issues. I am not going to make believe that this disease is pleasant or something that I would wish on anybody else, but it does have some secondary gains. One gain is Like this, at least it allows me time to get my business affairs in order. I am lucky in that way, in that the clarity of my thinking has not been affected.
The disease, because of its chronic nature, also allows me to say good-bye to people. If I had died of a heart attack, as did Norman Geschwind, I would not have had the opportunity to say good-bye to my wife, my children, my students, my friends, my colleagues and to say things that needed to be said. I think in everyone's life one enters into many relationships where things are not always talked through or said completely.
This is certainly true in my relationship with my Father. And when he died on March 14 of this year, one of the things I mourned was my failure to resolve my relationship with him. My disease at least allows me the opportunity of not making the same mistake twice; it allows me to say those things that I need to say to some people, especially my children and my wife, that I would not have said or have not said over the years.
A third so-called secondary gain of this disease is it gives me time to look back over my career and to get a feeling of just how successful or unsuccessful I have been. Have I really achieved the goals I wanted, career-wise, in my life? Tonight I would like to address this issue, namely the one pertaining to my career.
I should point out as background that when I went to college I was really uncertain about what I wanted to pursue in life. My parents had pushed very hard for me to become a medical doctor or at the very least a lawyer. Neither of these professions appealed to me very greatly. I
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From the Editor
We are pleased to be able to present this special issue in dedication to one of the true scientist-practitioners in our field, Dr. Nelson Butters. As neuropsychologist, Dr. Butters has touched all of us in one way or another, be it by his professional work (papers, workshops, etc), as his student, and/or his friend. I did not know Nelson well personally, but feel grateful that I was able to speak with him at conferences, where I found him very approachable. He even agreed to serve as a discussant for a symposium I was putting together, which unfortunately he could not fulfill due to his illness.
On behalf of the membership, I would like to thank
Nelsons' family, especially his wife Arlene for sharing his memoirs with
us. Special thanks also to Dr. Meryl Butters for helping to put this issue
together and making it a reality. Lastly, thank you Nelson for all that
you have done for us.
In every field of endeavor, certain individuals assume a prominent role because of their ideas, beliefs and accomplishments. Their influence is far-reaching, touching and inspiring other members of the field. Although I actually never sat in a classroom with him, nor was supervised by him, Nelson Butters' influence on my career and professional life was profound. I am indebted to Dr. Nelson Butters for many reasons: 1) his vast literature of scholarly research on alcoholic memory disorders, which essentially defined the neuropsychology of alcoholism, was the inspiration for my doctoral dissertation; 2) that same literature fostered, in large part, my very first funded research grant; 3) his lectures, chapters, and papers on memory disorders in amnesia and dementia provide the basis for my day-to-day work as a neuropsychologist; and 4) his dedication to our profession - as teacher, academic, and clinician - continues to be an inspiration and role model. I consider myself one of his students, and very fortunate to have been. When I told him this and thanked him for his help”, he quipped, ...you mean people in New Jersey actually read psychology journals?' Yes, Nelson, they do. Thank you once again.
Joel Morgan, Associate Editor, Division 40 Newsletter Newsletter 40
A LEGEND IN HIS OWN TIME
by Meryl Butters, James Becker, and Jason Brandt
Nelson Butters was more than a teacher; he was more than a friend; he was a parent to countless neuropsychologists, all of whom he called his students. Like any caring parent, Nelson nurtured us, taught us, scolded us when necessary (and occasionally when not necessary!), and guided us. But even as we mourned his death from ALS last year, we and dozens of other ACONB”s (Adult Children of Nelson Butters) remembered his fun-loving spirit, his outrageous antics, and his joy in the retelling of what we lovingly refer to as Nelson Butters stories.”
At every APA and INS meeting social hour that we can remember, Nelson could be found, beer in hand, listening to and recounting hilarious stories about friends, colleagues, and family. Most of the time, he played a leading role in these comedic docudramas. While many Nelson Butters stories have been deemed not fit to print, we were able to unearth a few suitable representative examples for this publication.
Perhaps one of the most intimate and intense experiences that any student can have is working one-on-one with his/her mentor. The intensity is perhaps greatest when dealing with a creative work; a research report, for example. Any criticism of one's creation is taken quite personally. However, anyone wanting to have a successful career in research needs to develop a very thick skin, and Nelson viewed this process of psychic callous formation as his single most important function as teacher and research supervisor. In order to try to avoid Nelson's inevitable lessons,” some students tried waiting until 4:30 Friday afternoon before delivering a manuscript to his mailbox. However, as Eric Granholm and others soon discovered, not only would Nelson receive their manuscripts, but he would phone them at home over the weekend to say that he was willing to meet at 7:30 Monday morning to discuss' it.”This was an offer that could not be refused. Nelson was extremely thorough in that way, he never liked to put off until tomorrow what he could make you suffer through today.
Other students tried turning in manuscripts early in the week, hoping they would be lost among the
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was very aware as a child, and as teenager, of my awkwardness with my hands; that is, my difficulty of acquiring motor skills with my hands, and I really felt uneasy about being a medical doctor, or trying to perform medical procedures for this reason. I did have confidence in my ability to talk and to speak publicly, but I found law, or the practice of law, to be rather boring and also not consistent with my desire to do something which would be of benefit to mankind. I had never been able to convince myself that lawyers did much else than satisfy their own needs and contribute much to society. As an aside, I might note that at this date, that is many years later, I still have the same feeling about lawyers and am very glad I never entered that profession.
So, at the time I was in college, first at the University of Chicago and then at Boston University, I really was uncertain as to what I wanted to do. I would say that some time during the second or third year of college my focus on my career became much clearer and I made a decision that I wanted to be a teacher of some sort. I didn't want to be a high school teacher but I did like the idea of teaching in college. As I said, public speaking came rather easily to me, and the whole idea of being able to influence the lives of college students in a positive way was most appealing to me. So by my fourth year of college I had pretty much decided that I would go on in psychology with the goal of ultimately being a college teacher.
What happened in my career was a matter of serendipity.
I entered the PhD Program at Clark University in the fall of 1960 with
my intentions aimed at the idea of being a teacher. In fact, I had been
awarded a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship for my first year of graduate school
because of my commitment to college teaching. During my second or third
year in graduate school, I happened to run across an article in the Journal
of Comparative and Physiological Psychology which was written, I guess,
in 1962 or 1963, by Mort Mishkin and H. Enger Rosvold. It was an article
dealing with frontal lobe functions in monkeys and dealt with delayed alternation
and basically reversal learning. At the time I had become very interested
in Piaget's notions about cognition and it seemed to me that there weresome
parallels between the work that Rosvold and Mishkin were doing with monkeys
on the frontal lobe and the work Piaget was doing with children.
More specifically, my feeling was that Rosvold and
Mishkin were looking at the neurological structures which were mediating
the developmental changes that Piaget talked about in most of his writings.
At that point I became fascinated with the idea of trying to actually explore,
in a study with both monkeys and humans, this possibility. I can concretize
it a little bit better for you by saying I became interested in what went
on in the brain, or what structures in the brain played a part in the development
of concrete operations or formal operations in the thinking processes of
children. During those days at Clark there was no physiological psychology
available to me. So I decided that after I received my PhD I would spend
a couple of years trying to study physiological psychology and perhaps
do a few studies on this issue of neurological bases of cognition before
I went on and pursued my teaching career.
At the end of my third year of graduate school, I wrote to H. Enger Rosvold at the NIH and asked him if he would consider taking me as a postdoctoral fellow, 12 months from then. At the time I did not think I had much hope of getting such a fellowship because of my total lack of background in physiological psychology. So I was quite delighted when I received the invitation in July or August of 1963 from Rosvold to visit his labs at NIH, and I accepted.
I am sure I did not impress them with my knowledge of much of anything, but I was very much impressed with them and I very much wanted to pursue a postdoctoral. I was lucky enough in those days that postdoctorals were very easy to get, and despite my lack of background in physiological psychology, I did get a fellowship and worked with Rosvold and Mishkin from 1964 to 1966. My work at that time at the NIMH dealt with the septal nuclei, the basal forebrain, and also with the caudate and their roles in reversal learning, delayed alternation performance, and so on.
After finishing my post-dot and spending one year at Wright State University, I returned to Boston in 1967, at the invitation of Harold Goodglass and Norman Geschwind, to continue my monkey work at the Boston VA and to work with Dee Pak Pandya on the anatomy of the frontal lobes. While I went there initially to do mostly monkey work, I realized, of course, that I would have an opportunity to also learn something about human neuropsychology, and it was in this period of 1967-70 that I was conducting both animal and human research simultaneously.
My 1970 paper with Mel Barton on the role of
the frontal and parietal lobes in concrete operations
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(what Piaget called concrete operations or reversible operations in space) contained much of my philosophy about neuropsychology. I think that article is one I was particularly proud of because it was the first to really go into the issue of what brain structures were involved in visual imagery, and I think that as most of you know, a few years after the publication of that article the whole topic about lateralization of visual imagery and the ability to do reversible operations with imagery became a major topic that people like Steve Kosslyn, Martha Farah, and Freda Newcombe all have investigated much more thoroughly than Barton and I did. However, I felt that my paper with Mel Barton really laid out for me the kind of research I wanted to do, namely, looking at the brain structures that were mediating abnormal cognition.I tried to show in that article that one could take the concepts that were popular in human cognition at that time and use them in a heuristic way so as to look at how different brain structures played a role in these cognitive processes. In many ways that first study with Barton ultimately led to my studies on memory with Korsakoff patients.
What essentially happened is that I began to raise a basic question as to why patients with parietal lobe lesions could not do reversible operations. One could argue that the defect was related to an inability to reverse images, that is, one could not manipulate images very well if one had a parietal lobe lesion.
On the other hand, it was possible that the deficit was not one of reversal, but one of retention. That is, that perhaps patients with right parietal lesions could not retain visual images and it was my desire to look at the ability of right parietal patients to retain visual images. This led me to the studies I did with Ina Samuels in 1971, 72 and 73. Many of these studies were published in Neuropsychologia. Basically these were the first studies in which we used the Peterson technique with verbal and pictorial material in order to look at short-term memory or short-term retention. The initial studies were done with right and left hemisphere patients and the original use of Korsakoff patients was as a control group - they were there so that we would have a group of brain-damaged controls that would be impaired on all the tests that we used, both verbal and nonverbal.
It was during the time that we ran those studies that I met Laird Cermak and started to look systematically at Korsakoff's disease and to look at the role of interference and encoding in their short-term memory defects, Again, this research reflected my basic belief that one could apply the concept of cognitive psychology to neurology. That is, one could combine the two and have a cognitive neuropsychology; a psychology in which one looked at the neurological basis of cognitive concepts, of cognitive processes.
My monkey work during those years, I think, was also of some importance. It was in the late 60's and early 70's that we did our studies on localization of function within the sulcus principalis and actually demonstrated that the middle third of the sulcus principalis was the critical region for delayed alternation and delayed response type of impairments. Along with Dee Pak Pandya, we were able to show that that particular region had a different pattern of efferent and afferent projections than did the anterior and posterior thirds.
It was during the early 70's that I also worked with Don Stein and Jeff Rosen on our studies of recovery of function. These studies, I think, were among the very first to show that one could remove sections of the frontal lobes in monkeys in serial fashion, that is, over a series of operations, and basically have recovery of function. That is, serial lesions compared to one-stage lesions led to much milder and in many cases no impairments on delayed alternation and delayed response type tasks. Although I did not follow these studies up in great depth I consider them to be important studies in my career. My reasons for not following them up are rather interesting in retrospect.
By 1973 monkeys had started to become somewhat expensive and the animal laboratory conditions at the Boston VA were less than optimal. There were poor heating facilities, very poor ventilation and Pandya and I lost numerous monkeys due to shigellae and other diseases which were directly traceable to the lack of an appropriate environment. On top of that, my skill as a surgeon was very, very limited. As I noted before, one of the reasons I did not go into medicine was because of the great difficulty I had acquiring motor skills with my hands, and surgery, neurosurgery in particular, brought out all my deficiencies. I had a great deal of tremor and a great deal of instability with my hands and I simply could not make the lesions I wanted to make in order to complete the studies that I wished to conduct. I also felt that it was inappropriate simply to delegate my lesion making to other people and, although Jeff Rosen was a competent surgeon, I knew that Jeff would not be there forever and I eventually simply reconciled myself to the idea that I would cease to do animal research and concentrate on my human research.
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By the middle 70's my work with Laird Cermak had become well known and had already begun to have an impact on the field. That is, more and more people were oorrowing concepts, as we had from cognitive psychology, and testing them with various brain-damaged populations. In the middle 70's I began also to look at other patient populations. It was in the early to mid-70's that I became interested in Huntington's disease for the first time. In my initial studies on this disorder the patients were used as a control group for the Korsakoff's. In my career it is rather interesting to note that many of my control groups in one study became a major focus of research in succeeding studies, and HD is a good example of that.
It was also in the mid-70's that I became interested in looking at the issue of alcoholism in general; that is the cognitive deficits in long-term alcoholics who did not have Korsakoff's disease. Initially my interest in this was to simply see what the similarities between non-Korsakoff alcoholics and alcoholic Korsakoff's were. I am not going to review my findings on this but I think it is fair to say that the papers that emanated from these studies, more specifically the papers with Chris Ryan and Jim Becker, Kathy Montgomery and Barbara Jones all influenced the way that the neuropsychology of alcoholism is now viewed.
There was also another trend in my research during the middle to late 70's which dealt with my desire to look at retrograde amnesia. I spent about 6- 7 years looking at anterograde amnesia and was rather struck that no one had really studied retrograde amnesia in any systematic way. It was also obvious to me that the reason for this was the lack of suitable test instruments. At that time I was lucky enough to have Marilyn Albert join our laboratory, and she took on the task of developing the Boston Retrograde Amnesia Battery. I should say she took this on with great enthusiasm and ultimately our studies in 1979, 1981, and our papers on patient PZ were a direct result of her great efforts in developing this battery in the middle and late 1970's.
Toward the end of the 70's it became very clear to me that I could not stay in Boston for my entire career. There were a number of reasons why I came to this conclusion. I think ultimately I felt that I did not want to work in a hostile environment. I felt that the environment. at the Boston VA, the environment that emanated from the administrators of the VA towards psychology research, was extremely hostile. I was also somewhat bothered that the medical school, people in the medical school who should have defended us, did not defend us. In fact, I was very turned off by the lack of support that we received from the Dean and from the Chairman of Neurology.
I made up my mind toward the late 70's that I would leave and build my own unit at some other medical school. As you all know, I had many false starts at leaving. Pittsburgh, Houston, and Maryland were all possibilities at one time or another. In retrospect, I am very glad I did not go to any of these places, because in 1983 I moved to UCSD at a most appropriate time for me and for UCSD. The UCSD Psychiatry Department offered me an opportunity that no other place did, namely, to take a clinical service and develop it with people who could do research as well as clinical work. In other words, to prove that within a VA setting a clinical psychologist could do research and could conduct major research programs at the same time as providing clinical service to patients. As far as I knew that was a rather rare occurrence in VA hospitals, which were generally quite hostile to research by clinical psychologists.
Another important consideration in my move to San Diego was the fact that clearly UCSD was going to be awarded a national Alzheimer's center. I also was aware that BU never had a chance of ever getting one of those centers and I did want to continue my work that I started with Huntington's disease and to, in a sense, generalize it to cortical dementias such as DAT. So, given the opportunities to develop my own psychology service and to be the Director of Neuropsychology at the Alzheimer's Center, in 1983 I moved to UCSD.
I think that my major accomplishments at UCSD have involved both administration and research. On an administrative level I have developed what I set out to develop, namely, a first-rate psychology service and, in particular, a superb neuropsychology group. I do not think that in terms of training, in terms of research, in terms of clinical developments, that there is another group in the country that is as good as the group I developed here.
My research accomplishments at UCSD fall into three distinct areas. One of my areas of research is focused on the processes that underlie the memory disorders of cortical and subcortical dementias and I think the work we have done comparing Alzheimer's and Huntington's patients in terms of the nature of their episodic and semantic memory defects has Newsletter 40
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clearly demonstrated that all dementias are not alike. That is, that different types of dementia manifest quite different types of memory disorders.
A second contribution has been that, once having found what some of these characteristics are that define a given type of dementia, these neuropsychological characteristics can be used for the early detection of the disease. Work with the CERAD battery, for instance, and with the WMS-R, or Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised, has shown that forgetting rates, or rapid forgetting, is a very good early indicator of DAT. Whereas in the case of patients with subcortical dementias like Huntington's disease, the rate of forgetting remains fairly normal.
A third area in which I think we made some contributions is in showing what structures underlie different types of implicit memory. That is, by comparing patients with cortical and subcortical dementias, we have been able to show various kinds of double dissociations between various kinds of implicit memory tasks and the two types of dementias. I think that our demonstration that patients with basal ganglia dementias are impaired specifically on implicit tasks that require the programming of motor movements, is a very important demonstration, and I think that this will tend to hold up over time. I think, however, that our grasp on what is the nature of the implicit memory defect one sees in Alzheimer's disease is still somewhat vague and I am not totally satisfied that we are on the right track with regard to this particular issue.
In terms of the research that I am currently involved in, I think there are two projects or general projects which have great promise. I am extremely impressed with the work that has been done with Agnes Chan, using multi-dimensional scaling to develop two- and three-dimensional models of the semantic networks and semantic spaces of patients with Alzheimer's and subcortical dementias. I think that work is very creative and extremely unique, and I am hoping that Agnes will be able to continue that even when I am not here to help her with those projects.
The other area that I am very excited about at this time is the work that has recently begun with Mark Bondi looking at the preclinical signs of DAT. That is, can one, using neuropsychological tasks, pick out those healthy elderly individuals who will most likely develop DAT in the next 3-4 years? His work with the CVLT showing that particular measures 6 such as intrusion errors and rapid forgetting are good early pre-clinical indicators of an upcoming DAT is most promising and is an area which I think will produce very important results in the long run.
I guess if I am going to be totally candid I should mention at least one area which I think is going to go nowhere in the future. That is the area of so-called implicit memory. Over the last 10 years I have become more and more discouraged about the so-called separation of explicit and implicit, and although I have not said this publicly for political reasons, I think that research is essentially going nowhere, and is going to hit a brick wall pretty soon. I really do not think there are separate memory systems such as explicit and implicit. I think there is only one system and I think what we are really looking at is that some patients can do some tasks but not others, and that the reason that they do some tasks and not others is because of the demands of the task and the nature of the task. I think we only need posit one memory system, if we look more clearly at the processes that the patients bring to bear on the demands of the task, and I think that a lot of the theorists who have proposed separate systems are going to find that their work is essentially going to hit a brick wall, and essentially that aspect of their work will come to an end. I think conceptually it is weak and it is nearing its end.
Now I would like to go back to a point I made earlier, namely, that when I went into this field my main objective was to be a teacher not a researcher. The outline I've provided you with would lead one to believe that I have not met any of my objectives. In essence, I gave up being a teacher. Well, that is not quite correct. I think the thing I am most proud of in my professional life is the success of my former students, that is, my former post-dots and my former graduate students.The great delight that I always got out of doing research was seeing the great pleasure that my students found in this kind of scholarly endeavor.I always enjoyed, in a sense, teaching a student how to think and how to write. I would never have been much of a technician or methodologist. I think my strengths are that I could always write well and that I could think about a problem in a very logical manner. One of the reasons I have always been seemingly one step ahead of the field is that I have always thought about problems in this very logical way. I have delighted in training so many students to think the way I think. I am not sure where I acquired this skill but it is something that I think I have successfully passed on
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to two or three generations of students. I am obviously extremely pleased to see people like Marilyn Albert, Jason Brandt, Jim Becker, Chris Ryan, David Salmon, and so on and so on, all do well in their professional careers. This is for me a great fulfillment of my desire to be a teacher. I think that the finest rewards I have received have been the thanks of students for the training I've given them and I don't think they really have ever understood how much they have also given to me over the years. Largely, because I don't think many of them really understood that teaching was actually my initial career choice.
So, as I look back over my career at this point I am obviously quite gratified and proud of the research that bears my name. But I am even prouder and happier about the students that I've trained. It is a wonderful feeling to know that you had a positive effect on other peoples' lives. I think that knowing this makes my death much more acceptable and allows me to be at peace with myself because I feel I've really made a difference in this world, and the difference has been the way I've affected the lives of the students who have passed by me. I want to thank these students for allowing me to really have a wonderful and fulfilling life, at least professionally.
I know that some people think that it is quite tragic
that I am facing death at a time when I've reached the pinnacle of my career.
But I have a somewhat different philosophy about this whole situation.
My view is that you can't judge a life or career by the length of its existence,
rather you have to judge it by the quality of its existence. I feel I have
accomplished a good deal on both the professional level and on a personal
level during my life. You know, it's like a party; just because a party
lasts a long time doesn't mean it's a good party. Some parties are much
shorter but very sweet, and that's the way my life has gone
A LEGEND IN HIS OWN TIME
government-issue, green Steelcase desk!) These hapless souls had their papers read, reviewed, and returned by air mail”.This usually involved a terse review (This is s-t!), and the manuscript sailing halfway across the room before having its paper clip fall off, sending the sheets flying every-which way.
Nelson sometimes liked to play cat-and-mouse by making only minimal corrections on the first 3-4 manuscript pages. This lulled Munro Cullum into a false sense of adequacy. Then, on the next page, Munro found what countless others had; a demonstration that it was indeed possible to use all the ink in a VA-issue red pen on a single sheet of paper!
Some of us (indeed one of your correspondents) thought he had done everything right, [six manuscripts (with another advisor) already published], and was therefore exempt from such reviews”.However, timing being everything, it turned out that one of Nelson's daughters (another correspondent) was absent without leave on Monday morning following a weekend road trip. As a result, a certain amount of displaced emotion was evident throughout the discussion of the paper - perhaps exacerbated by the minute-to-minute updates on his daughter's whereabouts.
Perhaps Nelson's greatest feature was his almost biological intolerance of an unhappy student or junior colleague.If someone needed a job, it was found. If they needed advice (or was too dull to know that they needed advice), it was given. If a significant other was wrong” for them, they were inevitably informed.Conversely, if she needed a significant other, or even a spouse, arrangements were made. For example, Nelson was frequently heard making comments to Diane Jacobs and her then-boyfriend Robert, such as: Diane, Robert is a prince. The day you two get married, a lot of women are going to jump off bridges. Robert will take good care of you and he'll always come home; Jewish men always do.”And to Robert: I don't see a ring on Diane's finger! Make your mother happy and get married!” (D'laneand Robert are now happily married.)
Perhaps Nelson's greatest achievement in the match-making arena involved his success at subverting the Immigration and Naturalization Service so that Terry Jernigan would stop moping around. The fact that Nelson was able to hire as fine a scientist as Arne Ostergaard was only a bonus. In less than 12 months and with only a few intercontinental telephone calls, Arne was offered a
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less than 12 months and with only a few intercontinental telephone calls, Arne was offered a position at UCSD. More importantly, he responded appropriately when instructed by Nelson to fish or cut bait” with Terry.
Nelson had excellent insights into human nature as well as his own clinical sensitivity”. He made it clear, for example, that he should never be the sole psychologist called to assist a suicidal patient perched on a window ledge.; it was his strong suspicion that he would tell the patient to jump! Nelson also had several quick and dirty” diagnostic rules: eye shadow on women was pathognomonic of hysteria, for example. On men, . . . well, don't get us started on that! He also felt strongly about the role of projective tests in clinical assessment, maintaining that any clinician who needed a Rorschach to diagnose psychosis would be better suited to a career in counseling psychology (with a specialization in couple's therapy)! However, Nelson's greatest contribution to clinical psychology may be the diagnostic category of VA dementia” (DSM-IV: ). Enough said.
Nelson's clinical adeptness combined with his keen sense of personal and professional loyalty when it came to a colleague in distress. One rainy fall day, as Jason Brandt was discussing his dissertation data with Nelson,a renowned neuropsychologist colleague arrived at Nelson's office. This scientist appeared ragged and distressed, relating that he was being held against his will at a local psychiatric hospital because of a plot to steal his research data. He had escaped from his captivity and wanted Nelson to help him retrieve his belongings. Nelson's reply was, Sure, just wait here. I'll see if Marlene (Oscar-Berman) is here so you two can catch up. Meanwhile, Jason, why don't you tell Dr. _about your dissertation.?” Nelson then ran down the hall to Marlene's office, where he called the psychiatric facility. Then he came back and said, Jason, go get your car. We're going to get Dr. _s stuff.” The three of them drove to the hospital, Nelson and his old friend went inside, and after about 15 minutes, Nelson came jogging out of the hospital alone. I had him committed! He's crazy!” He then pointed at Jason and said: remember, that's how I treat my friends!”
Nelson held strong opinions about certain government workers. He always validated these opinions with data: Ron Lewis' thesis that was destroyed by bomb-suspecting V.A. police; the secretary who would forward his calls to the elevator telephone; and the chief of staff who could not operate an elevator. However, for those government workers who were as dedicated to their work as Nelson was to his (and several do come to mind) he was both protective and supportive.
Nelson was prone to passionate outpourings of opinion. Sometimes we took these personally (we shouldn't have) and sometimes they were directed at other people whom he considered to be incompetent in some capacity, often at the VA (which we enjoyed). What was clear (only in retrospect, we are afraid) was that the intensity of these outbursts was a function of the frustration that he felt at a world that did not see things the way he did. In contrast to this was the sheer pleasure that Nelson derived from a Friday afternoon (late, after work) at the Village Coach House in Boston and later at the Elephant Bar in San Diego, discussing life, telling stories and enjoying the company of his lab members and colleagues. Or the traditional going away party -hosted at the site of the honoree's choice - where an entire afternoon could be wiled away. He was also very mischievous and as Dean Delis put it, he liked to stir the pot”. For example, he managed to arrange a wrestling match (with appropriate side bets) between his son Paul and Dean. Fortunately for Dean, Paul arranged to be much too busy that summer to ever complete the big match”.
We know of only one instance in which Nelson was at a loss for words - it illustrates his more sentimental side. Marilyn Albert had all of Nelson's papers published to that point, copied and bound in leather for his 45th birthday. When she presented him with them, he failed to respond - that is, he kept on talking about whatever subject they had been discussing and never even acknowledged the gift. Marilyn was obviously quite stunned and puzzled, until the next day when she received a thank you note from him.He had been so surprised and touched by the gift, that he had been unable to express his gratitude at the time.
Throughout this tribute, we have seen again and again evidence of a paradox of Nelson Butters. A caring and loving teacher who could cut a sloppy student to the quick; a highly professional scientist who was never observed to actually be working in his office; the often quiet and unstated high regard in which he held many colleagues.
By Nelson's own criteria he was a success. He once told Don Stuss: Don, its not what study you do, or how much you publish that really counts. The real criteria for success is whether you are a legend in your own time.” Oh, what a legend he has made.
As we said earlier, nearly everyone who knew him has a Nelson Butters” story. And he loved those stories! They were all the proof he or any of us needed to convince us that he indeed had achieved his goal of becoming a legend in his own time.” Newsletter 40
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Newsletter 40
IN HONOR OF NELSON M. BUTTERS, PhD, ABPP
Much has been said and written for and about Nelson Butters over the time when the shocking news of his illness first hit the neuropsychological community in 1993 until his death last fall. Like many others, I got the chance to tell him thank you, and to be sure that he knew how I felt.
As 1995-1996 President, I agreed with our Newsletter Editor, however, that this publication would be remiss in not marking the loss of such a friend and colleague in a way as special as he was to us. The cruel irony of a dreaded neurological disease striking a person whose life was devoted to understanding, preventing, and curing these diseases was lost on nobody. I can add little to the story of how Nelson handled his bad fortune with resolute courage, spirit and strength. He knew that ALS was a worthy enemy, and he acted accordingly.
Beyond a colleague with wit and ideas, we lost the kind of person who was living proof of the arrival of neuropsychology as a serious enterprise in the health sciences world. He was the quintessential second generation”neuropsychology leader with impressive bona fides in practice, education, and research. His professional citizenship in neuropsychology for this Division is its own legacy. In research he found ready alliances with many eminent scientists in his work, and as a full colleague in the medical arena and not as a research associate, as might have been the case in an earlier time.
His ideas were interesting and, more importantly, heuristic in nature. For every study that Nelson did, it seemed that three implications or consequences were born begging to be tested immediately. Finally, he developed a highly skilled and very active new generation of students who have been a major gift to our field in their own light.
We have lost a friend and major talent in our field.
But the people he taught and his ideas live on to help defeat brain disorders,
an outcome he would have thought a suitable answer to the disease that
took him from us. We are poorer for his loss, but much richer for his life.
Kenneth M. Adams, PhD, Past-President, Division 40
For the controversy that launched my career. But mostly for your letter and courage that helped me face my own paralysis. Thank you, Nelson.
My first collaboration with Nelson was for my Master's research at Clark University. I then got to know him better during my internship at the Boston VA Hospital in 1979-80. It was as a result of Nelson that I wrote the first of my three articles concerning the shortcomings of the Luria-Nebraska Battery. To his credit, Nelson encouraged new ideas, whether from colleagues or students. He also had an excellent sense of humor which was often tested by Edith Kaplan and her interns.
More importantly, Nelson made the effort to write me a letter after I suffered a horseback riding accident in 1994 and was paralyzed from the chest down. More than anyone else perhaps, Nelson could empathize with the losses I was facing. His letter reminded me that even in the face of catastrophe and our own mortality, our strength of character and perseverance can help us overcome our physical limitations. Along with the love and support of others, Nelson's letter helped me find the courage I needed to persevere in adapting to life in a wheelchair. I only regret that we never got to see each other again, chair to chair so to speak, in his lifetime.
Paul A. Spiers, PhD, Visiting Scientist, Clinical
Research Center, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
I also wanted to thank you for filling a number of late-night (for me) bicoastal phone conversations and for any interaction I had with you with humor and wit. I especially enjoyed your characterization of my husband, Paul, as the astrologist”; in reality, Paul is a physicist. He misses you, too.
And last of all, I thank you for being a wonderful role model for so many of us as a researcher, a teacher, and an academic. I learned a lost from you, though we never directly collaborated.
All my best,
Joani Borod (The Mt. Sinai Medical Center, Department of Neurology,
New York)
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Newsletter 40
My association with Nelson began long before I actually
met him (since I knew his daughter Meryl during graduate school prior to
my work with him at UCSD), and I am certain that his influence will remain
with me for many years to come. I had the fortune of knowing Nelson through
my phases of training as a predoctoral intern (he was fairly easy on me
then), as a postdoctoral fellow (he was harder on me during these years),
and as a neophyte academic and clinical neuropsychologist (here he was
hardest on me). Through his family and through his work, especially in
the last two years of his life, I believe I came to know of his tremendous
generosity. To have seen him continue working in the field he loved despite
his grave difficulties was truly an inspiration. Truth be told: he would
not have been able to accomplish most of what he did in his final year
without the unfailing support and extraordinary efforts of his wife Arlene.
In 1994 Nelson wrote: When I depart this world, I shall do so with the
knowledge that I have had some lasting positive effects on your lives and
perhaps the field of neuropsychology.”This, I think, represents one of
Nelson's rare instances of the use of understatement! Although he was in
the field for decades, his contributions will be with us for many more
decades and I will sorely miss his input - but not his editing! All right,
I'll miss his editing, too.
Mark W Bondi, PhD
RECOLLECTIONS OF NELSON BUTTERS
In my 26-year acquaintance with Nelson Butters, I
saw him in many roles - tireless and prolific researcher, concerned parent,
photographer, teacher, and friend. As his career developed, Nelson took
a deep and personal interest in professional affairs, holding major offices
in every neuropsychological organization, in addition to directing a clinical
and research complex in San Diego. One talent that ma& him so successful
in organizational politics was his terrific talent for keeping abreast
of the movements, plans, and personal and professional lives of everyone
who was anybody in our field. After Nelson had left Boston for San Diego,
I used to look forward to going out with him and Arlene so that I could
be filled in on what was happening behind the scenes in my own institution.
Nelson did not spread groundless rumors - he was always right on the money.
Harold Goodglass, PhD, Aphasia Disorders Research Center, Boston
University
ANNOUNCEMENTS
CALL FOR NOMINATIONS FOR APA FELLOWS
Becoming an APA Fellow recognizes evidence of unusual and outstanding contribution in the field of psychology and is an honor valued by the APA membership. We in Division 40 view Fellowship as an honor for the individual as well as for the Division, and we welcome nomination of outstanding members for this distinction.
In nominating a Division 40 member for Fellowship,
you are required to complete and submit a "Uniform Fellow Blank" along
with supporting material (e.g. a current vita, listing the nominee's publications
and indicating "R" for refereed). A minimum of three endorsement blanks
should written within the calendar year of nomination should be completed
by individuals who are current APA Fellows. Nomination of an existing Fellow
is also encouraged. If the nominee is being support by another division,
supporting documentation from that division should also be submitted, clearly
indicating the name of that division and contact person. Optional but recommended
material includes a nominee's self-statement setting forth the accomplishments
that warrant nomination for Fellow status. Nomination materials can be
obtained from the office of the Division 40 Fellowship Committee chair.
All nomination materials should be completed and
submitted to the Division's Fellowship Committee chair (not APA Central
Office) by December 15 of each year. This will allow time for the Division
Commitee to review all materials, make its decision, and forward its nominations
to the APA
Continued on page 11
[Page 11]
I am very pleased to be able to join in paying tribute to Nelson Butters, who was my colleague and close friend for nearly 30 years. I first met Nelson in Los Angeles in 1964, at a convention of the American Psychological Association. At that time, Nelson already had earned his PhD degree from Clark University, and was working as a postdoctoral research fellow with Hal Rosevold in the Neuropsychology Section of the NIMH. A few years later, in 1967, Nelson began working at the Boston VA Medical Center, already home to Norman Geschwind, Harold Goodglass, D. Frank Benson, Martin L. Albert, and Edith Kaplan. This highly talented group had interests in aphasia and related deficits of movement, perception, and other cognitive functions. Nelson added two new areas to the research activity: First, the use of a monkey model for the study of recovery of brain function; and second, an organized program on the nature of memory functions in amnesic states - particularly alcoholic Korsakoff's disease.
Nelson worked at the Boston VA for 16 years, and it is there that he wrote about 150 of his over 200 publications. Much of his work during that time focused on alcoholic Korsakoff's syndrome and varieties of dementing illnesses. During his Boston years, he made important contributions to research and practice related to memory disorders, and he won the VA's Career Scientist Award for Excellence in Research. It is important to emphasize that Nelson always had been an astute administrator, and he loved to teach. His work for the International Neuropsychology Society began early in the history of the society, and he was a Program Specialist at the VA in the 1980s. He began teaching psychology in the early 1960s, first at George Washington University, then at Ohio State, and at Antioch College. While in Boston, he taught at Wellesley College, the University of Massachusetts, Northeastern University, Clark University, and Boston University.
In 1983, Nelson moved to California to become Chief of the Psychology Service at the San Diego VA, and Professor of Psychiatry at UCSD School of Medicine, to apply his teaching, mentoring, and administrative skills there. In La Jolla, as in Boston, Nelson continued to attract talented young scientists, to publish prolifically, to give workshops all over the w o r l d , to mentor and train clinical neuropsychologists, and to receive honors for his contributions to the field. His many honors included his election to the office of President of the Division of Clinical Neuropsychology of the APA in 1982, his election as President of the International Neuropsychology Society in 1984, his being chosen in 1980 for a three-year term as VA Program Specialist for Behavioral Sciences nationally, and receiving the VA's highly prestigious Career Contribution Award for his decades of loyal service. During his tenure as Editor-in-Chief of Neuropsychology, Nelson crafted the journal with the same skill and devotion that he gave to his students, and inspired in his colleagues. We miss him very much.
Marlene Oscar Berman, PhD
Professor of Psychiatry, and
Professor of Neurology
Boston University School of Medicine Newsletter 40
Announcements
Continued from page 10
Membership Committee for its February 15 deadline. Successful nominations are announced in August following the APA annual meeting.
Stan Berent, PhD, Professor and Chief of Psychology, Director, Neuropsychology Division, University of Michigan Hospitals (0840), Ann Arbor, MI 48109-0849. Phone: (313) 763-9259; Fax: (313)936-9262; e-mail; sberent@umich.edu
EDITOR SOUGHT
The Publications and Communications Board has opened
a search for a new editor for Developmental Psychology. The position is
for the years 1999-2004; the incumbent editor is Caroly Zahn-Waxler, PhD.
Candidates should be members of APA and should be available to start receiving
manuscripts in early 1998 to prepare for issues published in 1999. Please
note that the P&C Board encourges participation by members of underrepresented
groups in the publication process and would particularly welcome such nominees.
Self nominations are also encouraged.
To nominate candidates, prepare a statement of one
page or less in support of each candidate and send to the chair of the
Search Committee, Janet Shibley Hyde, PhD, c/o Lee Cron, P&C Board
Search Liason, American Psychological Association, 750 First Street, NE,
Washington, DC 20002-4242.
Members of the search committee are Bennet Bertenthal,
PhD, Susan Crockenberg, PhD, Margaret Spencer, PhD, and Ester Thelen, PhD.
First review of nominations will begin December 9, 1996.
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Newsletter 40
Newsletter 40 is the official publication of Division 40. The Editor
is John DeLuca; the Associate Editor is Joel E. Morgan. Submissions and
correspondence regarding the newsletter should be addressed to the editor,
Dr. John DeLuca, Neuropsychology and Neuroscience Laboratory, Kessler
Institute for Rehabilitation, 1199 Pleasant Valley Way, West Orange, NJ
07052
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