Language

Question 1

Brain Asymmetry

Answer 1

1. Left hemisphere dominant for language
2. righ hemisphere also participates in the production and comprehension of language
   
   1. if right is injured: subtle linguistic impairments including abnormalities in prosody, syntax, and pragmatic language skills.
3. If Left is lost early in dvlp or is damaged in adulthood by stroke: the right assumes some language functions
   4.

Question 2

APHASIA

broca’s aphasia

Wernicke’s aphasia

Conduction/Associative Aphasia

Trancortical Aphasia

Global Aphasia

Answer 2

Aphasia: impaired language production and/or comprehension as the result of brain damage

1. Broca’s Aphasia= expressive, motor, and nonfluent aphasia. damage to the dominant frontal lobe (left).
   
   1. speak slowly and w/great difficulty, poor articulation, lacks intonation, stress, rhythm (dysprosody), omit much grammar.
   2. Anomia: inability to name a common object, attribute or actions.
   3. However, comprehension is only somewhat impaired.
   4. aware of deficits and are frustrated, anxious and depressed.

Question 3

2. Wernicke’s Aphasia

Answer 3

Wernicke’s Aphasia: (receptive, impressive, sensory and fluent aphasia) caused by damage to Wernicke’s area in the dominant (left) temproal lobe.

1. difficulty understanding written and spoken language and generating meaningful language.
2. speech is rapid, effortless, and appropriate syntactical structure, but largely devoid of content.
3. Anomia and Paraphasia: substitution of words related in sounds or meaning to the intended words. also problems with repetition.
4. usually unaware that their speech is meaningless (b/c they can’t understand language!)

Question 4

3. Conduction (Associative) Aphasia

Answer 4

Conduction Aphasia: Wernicke’s and Broca’s area are connected by the arcuate fasciculus and damage can produce:

1. Conduction Aphasia: language comprehension is ok, but does result in anomia, paraphasia, and impaired repetition.

Question 5

4. Trancortical Aphasia

Answer 5

Transcortical Aphasia: lesions outside of Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas that disconnect these areas from other regions of the brain.

Damage isolates:

1. Broca’s area = transcortical motor aphasia =nonfluent, effortful speech, lack of spontaneous speech and anomia with good comprehension and no repetitions.
2. Wernicke’s area = transcortical sensory aphasia = Deficits in comprehension, anomia, fluent (meaningless) speech with no repetitions.
3. Both Broca/Wernicke = mixed transcortical aphasia = able to talk but have noting to say and unable to understand written and spoken language. Can produce automatic responses and repeat words, phrases and sentences spoken by others.

Question 6

5. Global Aphasia

Answer 6

Global Aphasia: caused by widespread brain injury involving Broca’s and Wernicke’s as well as other areas in the left frontal, temporal and parietal lobes.

1. extensive disruption in the ability to produce and understand language.
2. can say few words and produce automatic speech.
3. accompanied by right hemiplegia, right hemisensory loss and right hemianopia (loss of the right visual field in both eyes). stroke-like symptoms.