4B: Language Disorders

Question 1

Dorsal stream in language

Answer 1

dorsal regions of the brain involved in speech production

Question 2

Ventral stream in language

Answer 2

ventral regions of the brain involved in speech comprehension

Question 3

The Hickok-Poeppel language model

Answer 3

a model of brain areas involved in language comprehension and speech production; describes dorsal pathway for production and ventral pathway for comprehension

Question 4

Aphasia

Answer 4

from Greek for ‘lack of speech” that is not a result of deficits in sensory, intellectual, or psychiatric functioning, nor muscle weakness; deficit arises from damage language- specific cortical regions; several types of aphasia exist

Question 5

Broca’s aphasia

Answer 5

aphasia characterized by slow, effortful speech output lacking function words, problems with grammar and articulation, in which patients rely on high- frequency content words. Patients have deficits in repetition, naming, and fluency, but can comprehend normally.

Question 6

Wernicke’s aphasia

Answer 6

aphasia characterized by fluent, meaningless speech with many semantic errors and little understanding. Patients have deficits in repetition, naming, comprehension, and have paraphasic fluency. In severe causes, patients appear to have no concept of what language is for.

Question 7

Paraphasia

Answer 7

a notable feature of aphasia in which one loses the ability of speaking correctly, substitutes one word for another, and changes words and sentences in an inappropriate way. The patient’s speech is fluent but is error-prone, e.g. ‘treen’ instead of ‘train’.

Question 8

Word salad

Answer 8

apparently fluent speech, but meaningless; seen in Wernicke’s aphasia

Question 9

Anosognosia

Answer 9

a deficit of self-awareness; a condition in which a person who suffers a certain disability seems unaware of the existence of his or her disability.

Question 10

Paraphasia

Answer 10

a condition in which one loses the ability to speak correctly, substituting one word for another, and changing words and sentences in an inappropriate way

Question 11

Arcuate fasciculus

Answer 11

the neutral white matter pathway connecting Broca’s area and Wernicke’s areas

Question 12

Conduction aphasia

Answer 12

aphasia due to damage to the arcuate fasciculus resulting in poor repetition and naming, but normal comprehension and fluency

Question 13

Transcortical sensory aphasia

Answer 13

aphasia that is similar to Wernicke’s aphasia, except that patients are able to repeat language they have just heard (but still do not comprehend it)

Question 14

Transcortical motor aphasia

Answer 14

aphasia associated with right hemiparesis (paralysis or inability to move) that is similar to Broca’s aphasia, except patients are able to repeat

Question 15

Global aphasia

Answer 15

aphasia, associated with right hemiparesis, characterized by severe communication difficulties in both speech and comprehension; Patients may have no concept of language as communication.

Question 16

Transcortical mixed aphasia

Answer 16

similar to global aphasia, but patients are still able to repeat

Question 17

Anomic aphasia

Answer 17

aphasia in which word-finding is severely impaired, usually from damage to parietal and/or temporal lobes, and patients resort to circumlocution

Question 18

Averbia

Answer 18

specific aphasia in which patient loses ability to use verbs

Question 19

Color anomia

Answer 19

specific aphasia in which patient loses ability to use color words

Question 20

Circumlocution

Answer 20

the use of other words to describe a specific word or idea which cannot be remembered (means ‘talking around’ something)

Question 21

Pure word deafness

Answer 21

the selective inability to comprehend
the spoken word, in the absence of aphasia or defective basic hearing. Perception of
environmental sounds and other complex, non-speech sounds is generally normal. Pure
word deafness is usually caused by bilateral damage to temporal lobes (often including
white matter connecting temporal and frontal lobes). Patients can still read and write.

Question 22

Amusia

Answer 22

the selective inability to recognize musical tones or to reproduce them (agnosia
for music). It involves loss of the ability to recognize musical notes, rhythms, and
intervals and the inability to experience music as musical. Patients often describe music
as being indistinguishable from the sound of pots and pans banging together. Amusia can
be congenital (present at birth) or be acquired sometime later in life (as from brain
damage)

Question 23

Speech entrainment therapy

Answer 23

patients practice mimicking audio-visual speech stimuli; this therapy can enable them to produce fluent speech in real time.

Question 24

Subsystems of speech

Answer 24

Respiration, phonation, resonance, articulation

Question 25

Respiration

Answer 25

the process of breathing

Question 26

Phonation

Answer 26

the process by which the vocal fold produce certain sounds through quasi-periodic vibration

Question 27

resonance

Answer 27

the prolongation of sound during speech

Question 28

Articulation

Answer 28

the movement of the tongue, lips, jaw, and other speech organs to make speech sounds

Question 29

Dysartharia

Answer 29

motor disorder affecting any or all of the 4 subsystems of speech

Question 30

Spastic dysarthria

Answer 30

motor disorder caused by damage to the upper motor neurons. Remember that upper motor neurons originate in motor region of the cerebral cortex and carry motor information down to the lower motor neurons at a specific brain stem or spinal cord level

Question 31

Causes of spastic dysarthria?

Answer 31

cerebral palsy, stroke, multiple sclerosis

Question 32

Symptoms of spastic dysarthria

Answer 32

harsh, strained voice; vocal pitch breaks; reduced speed of articulation

Question 33

Flaccid dysarthria

Answer 33

motor disorder caused by damage to the lower motor neurons. Remember that the lower motor neurons bring the nerve impulses from the upper motor neurons out to the muscles

Question 34

causes of flaccid dysarthria

Answer 34

Brainstem stroke, cranial nerve palsy, myasthenia gravis (a chronic autoimmune
neuromuscular disorder that is characterized by fluctuating weakness of the voluntary muscle groups)

Question 35

Symptoms of flaccid dysarthria

Answer 35

reduced lip closure and strength of articulatory; hyper-nasality, breathy voice

Question 36

Speech apraxia

Answer 36

a developmental or acquired problem with speech production not associated with muscle weakness. Its symptoms include difficulty putting sounds and syllables together in the correct order to form words. The condition may be developmental as in the verbal apraxia of childhood, or acquired (from disease, trauma).

Question 37

Stuttering

Answer 37

a speech disorder in which the flow of speech is disrupted by involuntary repetitions and prolongations of sounds, syllables, words or phrases, and involuntary silent pauses. It may be caused by genetic mutations and/or head trauma. Therapy includes relaxation techniques, singing, and choral reading.

Question 38

Cluttering

Answer 38

a fluency disorder in which the patient has a problem with rate, word confusion, and disorganized thoughts. Language is most clear at the start of utterances, but rate increases and intelligibility decreases towards the end. Patients are often not aware of the disorder, but can improve with therapy that focuses on attending to speech details. The cause is not known.

Question 39

Spoonerisms

Answer 39

phonemic substitution

Question 40

Malapropisms

Answer 40

wrong word substitution

Question 41

Freudian slips

Answer 41

error in speech from ;unconscious mind’