Despite the persistence of deficits in visuospatial cognition after years of abstinence, when intact performance levels are observed, they have been attributed to reorganization of brain functioning (Pfefferbaum et al., 2001a). For example, Fama et al. (2004) reported that whereas visuospatial abilities predicted performance on visuoperception tasks by nonalcoholic control participants, for alcoholics it was executive ability, as measured by the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test, that consistently predicted performance on visuoperception tasks. Because completing the Wisconsin Card Sorting Test relies heavily on frontal brain circuitry, the authors suggested that alcoholics likely engage additional frontal systems to perform visuoperceptal tasks at the level of nonalcoholics. In another study, Rosenbloom et al. (2004) compared the cognitive performance of alcoholic and nonalcoholic women across three durations of abstinence (three months, one year, and four years) and found better performance with increased lengths of sobriety for visuospatial scores as measured by the Digit Symbol subtest of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale. After four years of abstinence, the alcoholic women had achieved a performance level that was not significantly different from that of nonalcoholic women.
