Language in the brain Flashcards
What is language?
intention to communicate
symbol usage
ability to articulate something new
Grammar
ability to represent real world situations
What did Rumbaugh (1977) say about language?
“an infinitely open system of communication”
What are the two behaviours of language?
Language production - from thoughts to mouth and tongue movement
Language comprehension - from sound waves to thought
What are the 2 forms of language?
Auditory (spoken)
Visual (written or signed)
What biological systems does language involve?
Auditory system, visual system, motor system, memory
What is aphasia?
Disorders of speaking and listening caused by stroke, tumour or head injury
What is dementia?
Progressive, degenerative brain disorder which can also affect speech and language
What happened to ‘Tan’ (Broca, 1861)?
French hospital patient with lesion that resulted in:
- single syllable speech (“tan”)
- good intonation
- obvious frustration at deficit
Also lost use of right arm & hand
What did an autopsy reveal about ‘Tan’ after his death? (Broca, 1861)
A lesion in a region in his left frontal lobe –> Broca’s area
What is Broca’s aphasia?
‘expressive’ or ‘production’ aphasia:
slow, deliberate, effortful speech production
non-fluent
omission of grammatical markers
BUT, comprehension is unaffected
Damage to Broca’s area (LEFT hemisphere only)
What happened to Wernicke’s (1874) patients?
Case report on 2 patients
- Relatively fluent speech
- Create new words - ‘neologisms’
- Severely impaired comprehension
What did Wernicke (1874) find in the post mortems of his 2 patients?
Lesion in a region of the left temporal lobe (Wernicke’s area)
What are some of the main differences between Broca’s (non-fluent, expressive) aphasia and Wernicke’s (fluent, receptive) aphasia?
- Those with Broca’s aphasia are generally aware of there deficit while those with Wernicke’s aphasia are generally unaware
- Those with Broca’s aphasia have dysfluent speech production whilst those with Wernicke’s aphasia are fluent but speech is usually content-free (Jargon)
- Those with Broca’s aphasia produce very few function words whereas those with Wernicke’s aphasia often use function words appropriately but content words are often replaced with neologisms
- Those with Broca’s aphasia have agrammatism in comprehension as well as production but are able to comprehend speech whereas those with Wernicke’s aphasia have severe comprehension deficits
What are circumlocutions?
Talking around a specific word
What are paraphasias (+ examples)?
A language output error associated with aphasia
Phonemic paraphasia, Neologistic paraphasia, Semantic paraphasia, perseverative paraphasia
What is phonemic paraphasia?
incorrect phonemes are substituted eg. pike/pipe
What is neologistic paraphasia?
the use of non-real words in place of the intended word. eg. Pinwad/light
What is semantic paraphasia?
when an entire word is substituted for the intended word. eg. girl/wife