Lateralisation, Language and Intelligence Flashcards
What is lateralisation?
Lateralisation is the localisation of a function in one hemisphere or the other.
What is split-brain operation?
Where pathways connecting the right and left hemispheres are severed, called commissures.
What is the largest commissure?
The corpus callosum.
What commissure links the two temporal lobes?
The anterior commissure.
What commissure links the right and left hippocampi?
The hippocampal commissure.
What is savant behaviour?
Exceptional skills and talents found in people whose intellectual functioning otherwise falls within the range of mental retardation.
What is associated with right-hemisphere function?
- Art.
- Music.
- Spatial relations.
What is Rasmussen’s syndrome?
A rare brain disorder that produces seizures in only one hemisphere.
- Generally in children under the age of 5.
How is Rasmussen’s syndrome treated?
The only course of treatment is the removal of one entire hemisphere.
What is neuroplasticity?
Changes in the neurons of neural pathways, as a result of behaviour, environment, neural processes, thinking or emotions, and damage.
What is the left hemisphere associated with?
- Language.
- Mathematics.
- Logical processing.
How is language defined?
The communication of thoughts and feelings through a system of arbitrary signals as voice sounds, gestures, or written symbols.
Which brain region is believed to play a significant role in speech production.
The left inferior frontal region.
- This area is now called Broca’s area.
How is aphasia defined?
Total or partial loss of the ability to either produce or comprehend spoken language.
What are the symptoms of Broca’s area?
- Difficulty in producing speech.
- Very slow speech, that requires significant effort.
- Errors occur in the pronunciation of some phonemes.
What is anomia?
A condition where patients have difficulty retrieving the correct words for ideas they wish to express.
What brain areas are affected in Wernicke’s aphasia?
The superior surface of the left temporal lobe.
What are the symptoms of Wernicke’s aphasia?
- Rapid speech.
- Fluent, but virtually meaningless speech.
- Patients are unaware that they’re not making sense.
What is the quality of speech in conduction aphasia?
Speech remains fluent, and comprehension is fairly good.
Although,
- They find it nearly impossible to repeat a sentence.
- They find the task of naming pictures and objects difficult.
What is global aphasia?
A deficit that combines all the previously mentioned deficits.
The abilities to speak, comprehend, read and write are impaired.
What is transcortical aphasia a result of?
Damage to connections and cortical areas associated with major language areas.
What is the quality of speech in transcortical aphasia?
- Speech is fluent.
- Repetition is possible.
- BUT, auditory comprehension is poor.
- ‘Semantic paraphasia’ is common.
What is Alexia?
A reading deficit.
‘pure word blindness’
The individual can speak and understand normally - but are unable to read or point at letters on request.
What is Agraphia?
A writing deficit.
The inability to write.
- This may arise from damage to the motor area responsible for making skilled movement.
