Verbal short-term store-rehearsal system and the cerebellum. Evidence from a patient with a right cerebellar lesion

We describe an 18-year-old patient who underwent the surgical removal of the right cerebellar hemisphere due to presence of neoplastic lesion. The patient showed a transient selective verbal Short-Term Memory (STM) impairment characterised by reduced verbal span. An extensive assessment of patient's STM allowed identifying the functional locus of the deficit at the level of the phonological output buffer, a component of the rehearsal process of the STM-store-rehearsal system. This finding is consistent with previous functional (PET) studies showing the involvement of the right cerebellum in the silent recirculation of verbal information. We conclude that the cerebellum takes part in the planning of speech production also at a level that does not require an overt articulatory property.