Language and Cognition

Question 1

Why do we need to know about language?

Answer 1

• common in stroke
• dementia presentation
• Autism ⇒ delay in development
• Movement disorders; change in speech patterns

Question 2

What does language involve?

Answer 2

• reading
• writing
• speaking (expressive language function)
• understanding (receptive language function)

Question 3

What is language function a prime example of?

Answer 3

how the brain takes sensory information and generates symbolic representations which can be vocalised and shared

Question 4

Define neurolingustics

Answer 4

how language is represented in the brain

Question 5

How is muscle movement controlled in the cerebral hemispheres?

Answer 5

each hemisphere is resonsible for movement on the contralateral side of the body

Question 6

Describe the hemisphere functions in higher conrtical functions

Answer 6

the hemispheres are lateralised

Question 7

What is the left cerebral hemisphere responsible for?

Answer 7

Analytic tasks

Maths and language

Question 8

What is the right cerebral hemisphere responsible for?

Answer 8

Recognition of complex patterns

Faces and melodies

Question 9

Define aphasia

Answer 9

problems producing speech

Question 10

What causes aphasia?

Answer 10

language deficit caused by damage to the brain

stroke or accident/trauma

Question 11

What area is affected in non-fluent (motor) aphasia?

Answer 11

Front left cortex (Broca’s area)

Question 12

What are the main features of Broca’s Aphasia?

Answer 12

▪ Speech is very halting
▪ Function words are omitted (it, is, to, a etc.)
▪ Pronunciation is simplified (spoon > poon etc.)
▪ Inflectional endings are omitted (running > run etc.)

Question 13

What did Carl Wernicke observe?

Answer 13

observed a patient who could speak and who could hear, but was unable to understand the spoken word

Question 14

What area is affected in Wernicke’s aphasia?

Answer 14

lateral temporal cortex

Question 15

What are the features of Wrnicke’s aphasia?

Answer 15

someone will speak in phrases sounding normal/fluent BUT words lack meaning

Question 16

How do monolinguals and multilinguals differ?

Answer 16

multilinguals have more right hemisphere dominance than monolinguals

Question 17

How many more times likely are multilinguals likely to develop aphasia?

Answer 17

5x more likely than monolinguals

Question 18

In what hemisphere does language processing occur in a right handed person?

Answer 18

left hemisphere task

Question 19

What is the ear advantage of linguistic sounds?

Answer 19

right ear advatnage (left hemi)

LANGUAGE

Question 20

What is the ear advatnage of environmental sounds

Answer 20

left ear advantage

MUSIC AND TONE

Question 21

Describe how the meaning of words is processed

Answer 21

• Is processed all over the cortex
• Huth et al, 2016 had people listen to hours of radio while in an FMRI scanner
• He analysed the pattern of the 50,000 voxels
• Every meaning appeared in multiple locations, and every location contained a cluster of related meanings. Some areas selectively responded to words related to people, for instance, whereas other responded to places or numbers

Question 22

What is the process of lexical retrival

Answer 22

1. An object triggers a concept (non-verbal)
2. Semantic lexicon; which has a number of words/info relating to the concept
3. triggers phonological output lexicon including relevent metric, physical aspects; sounds, vowels and consonants **Frequently used words/outputs are primed for use when the meaning requires it
4. Phonological output buffers the montiors and orders the output of the sounds and words to be used

Question 23

How is the right hemisphere involved in language?

Answer 23

involved in emotional aspects analyses the prosaic and ‘musical’ aspects of speech

Question 24

What is the clinical importance of language?

Answer 24

• When did they start to talk?
• How they say things
• What they say
• What is that persons normal