Language

Question 1

What is aphasia?

Answer 1

A broad term used clinically to describe language disorders.

Question 2

What are the 5 key elements of language?

Answer 2

Phonemes - smallest unit of sound that makes a difference to meaning

Morpheme - smallest unit of language that has meaning. e.g. un-, -ing, -ish.

Semantics - meaning of words or sentences

Syntax - how words are combined to construct phrases and sentences

Grammar - all of the rules for usage of a language

Question 3

What is paraphrasia?

Answer 3

Substitution for a word

Error in language

Phonemic paraphrasia - error in sound

Semantic paraphrasia - error in meaning

Question 4

What is neologism?

Answer 4

an entirely novel word

Question 5

What is nonfluent speech?

Answer 5

talking with considerable effort.

Question 6

What are some collective signs of possible aphasia?

Answer 6

paraphasia
neologism
nonfluent speech

Question 7

Where is Wernicke’s are located?

Answer 7

Temporal lobe

Question 8

Where is Brocas area?

Answer 8

Frontal lobe

Question 9

Who is patient Tan? what were their lesions?

Answer 9

This was one of Broca’s patients and had a lesion in the low region on the left frontal lobe. Due to this, there was a loss of speech, he could understand what people were saying but couldn’t say anything back but a few repeated utterances.

Also had lesions to sub-cortical regions and a history of epilepsy.

Question 10

What was the phenomenon that Wernicke experienced in his patients?

Answer 10

Patients with lesions couldn’t comprehend what was being said, couldn’t understand, monitor or identify their own speech and could speak fluently but makes no sense.

Question 11

What is Lichtheim’s house?

Answer 11

It is a proposed disconnection model of aphasia predicting different types of language based on the process disrupted.

Question 12

In the Wernicke - ‘Geschwind’ model of language, what is the process that underpins speaking a word we hear?

Answer 12

1. Process starts primary auditory cortex
   Sound analysed and decoded passed to
2. Wernicke’s area
   Sound information analysed determining the word that was said.
3. Transmission
   Sounds transmitted via arcuate fasciculus (white matter sub-cortical tract).
4. Brocas area
   Forms a motor plan to repeat the word and sends that information to
5. Primary motor cortex
   Allows the muscles in the throat mouth and jaw to execute the motor plan - a word form that we recognise and then executed

Question 13

What is ‘fluent’ or Wernicke’s aphasia and what is Wernicke’s area suggested to link?

Answer 13

Generally results from injury in the vicinity of Wernicke’s area in the left superior temporal cortex posterior to the primary auditory cortex.

This region has been suggested as the locus of memory for the constituent sounds of speech; linking the auditory representations of words with their meanings.

Question 14

What is the consequence of damage to Brocas area?

Answer 14

We can understand what is said, but can’t activate the motor plan allowing us to speak

Question 15

In the Wernicke - ‘Geschwind’ model of language, what is the process that underpins speaking a written word?

Answer 15

1. The primary visual cortex analyses the image and transmits the information to angular gyrus.
2. The angular gyrus decodes the image information to recognise the word and associate this visual form with the spoken form in Wernicke’s area
3. The information about the word is transmitted via the arcuate fascicules to Broca’s area
4. Broca’s area formulates motor plan to say the appropriate word and transmits that plan to motor cortex for implementation
5. Primary motor cortex
   allows the mouth to move.

Question 16

what is Brocas Aphasia?

Answer 16

Injury in Broca’s area, the posterior part of the inferior frontal convolution in the left hemisphere (i.e., left inferior frontal lobe)

Lies anterior to primary motor cortex, meaning muscles used for speech are damaged.

Results in destruction of the memory traces of the movements required to produce speech.

Question 17

What are all the symptoms of Brocas Aphasia?

Answer 17

Symptoms (i)
Slow, effortful, laborious speech
Telegraphic speech

Symptoms (ii)
Producing inappropriate phoneme or word
Saying the word pill instead of spill

Symptoms (ii)
Preservation - words they know, will be used more often.

Hemiplegia - partial paralysis of one side of the body (usually the right, because the lesion often extends to the nearby motor cortex in the left hemisphere

Insight intact
They know what they want to say but cannot get the words out

Symptoms (iv)
Language comprehension is intact. Can be fooled in syntactically dense questions. Have difficulty with nouns and propositions.

Question 18

What are the symptoms of Wernickes aphasia?

Answer 18

Symptoms (i)
Impaired ability to comprehend speech, that of others and of patients themselves

Fluent, grammatical speech production without effort or distress. Speech retains the information pattern, rhythm, and pronunciation of normal speech

Jargon-like words make their speech difficult to interpret. Including paraphasia’s.

Semantic paraphasia’s - the individual makes an error

Symptoms (iii)
Talking around a word to convey meaning, rather than saying the word ‘someone who sweeps and clears, rather than cleaner’

Impaired ability to repeat words and sentences

Do not impair motor ability

Intact understanding of facial expressions

Often poor insight into language difficulties

Question 19

What is conduction aphasia?

Answer 19

This is where both the Wernicke and Broca’s area is intact but there is damage to the subcortical link between the two, called the arcuate fasciculus.

This is where people have trouble with words that don’t have a visual association or words that are difficult to repeat when there isn’t an accurate representation of the word.

Question 20

What is Auditory input in Lichtheims model?

Answer 20

this is where we activate and recognise the word form. Activation of decoded word is sent to the motor processes, activating the spoken word form.

Question 21

What is the Motor input in Lichthems model?

Answer 21

known as Broca’s area; spoken word then triggers out put of speech of the mouth, tongue to produce the word

Question 22

Where are people with disruption in Wernicke’s and Brocas area expected to find this in the Lichtheim’s house?

Answer 22

respectively,

Broca’s people have disruption in M

Wernicke’s people have disruption in A

Question 23

What is the proposed B concept area in the Lichtheims model?

Answer 23

Where word associations might be. i.e. visual image that is associated with a word, perhaps meaning of the word, all in the concept area

People with conduction Aphasia, cannot send information via the arcuate fascicules, but they still have a pathway in tact between the auditory and concept area, activated word form may link to the concept area.

Hippopotamus, auditory and visual representation, image associated with word

People can go via this other pathway.