Lecture 9 - Language Disorders Flashcards
What categories can language disorders be divided into?
Language Comprehension and Language Production
What problems do patients have in language disorders in terms of language comprehension?
Problems in understanding the language
What problems do patients have in language disorders in terms of language production?
Problems in producing language while able to understand almost everything.
What is dys-?
Partial loss deficit or impairment of the function, or developmental issues
What is a-?
Total loss of function or acquired issues.
What are the language disorders in terms of language comprehension?
Dyslexia, alexia/ word blindness, auditory verbal agnostic/ pure word blindness
What are language disorders in terms of language production regarding speech?
Aphasia/ dysphasia, Dysarthria/ Anarthria, Verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia, Stuttering
What are language disorders in terms of language production regarding handwriting?
Agraphia
What difficulties do people dyslexia have?
Having partial loss in terms of reading and writing
What deficits are dyslexia accompanied by?
Deficits in phonological processing
Why is dyslexia accompanied by deficits in phonological processing?
This is due to patients unable to form the processing of phonological words (they cannot map the separate parts of words into phonological representation of words that make it difficult to understand the words).
Is dyslexia a developmental/ acquired issue?
Developmental issue
The neuroanatomical roots of dyslexia are c_______.
Complicated as the nueroanatomical problems are heterogeneous and are not caused by a single region.
Alexia is an a________ dyslexia.
acquired dyslexia (e.g. due to brain injuries / stroke)
What is alexia?
A total loss of reading and writing ability and that is more severe than dyslexia.
What is word blindness?
Patients cannot recognise words but they can still recognise images as they have intact visual system.
What are the two types of alexia?
Alexia with agraphia and Alexia without agraphia
What is alexia without agraphia?
Pure word blindness: have difficulty in reading, but not in writing and spelling
Why people with alexia without agraphia can still write and spell while unable to read?
Because the function of brain responsible for reading is lost while the parts responsible for writing and speaking are still intact.
What anatomical issues cause alexia without agraphia?
Occlusion of the left posterior cerebral artery
What is alexia with agraphia?
Difficulty in reading, spelling and writing
What anatomical issues cause alexia with agraphia?
Lesions of the dominant inferior parietal lobule, in the region of the angular gyrus, and the lesions of the dominant postier middle frontal gyrus (Exner’s area).
What is Exner’s area?
It is right above Broca’s area and is responsible for writing.
What is auditory verbal agnosia/ pure word deafness?
Problems in recognition of auditory verbal information that the person cannot understand any spoken words.
Auditory verbal agnostic is an auditory form of what?
Auditory form of alexia.
Can people with auditory verbal agnostic/ pure word deafness read, write and produce speech?
People with uditory verbal agnostic/ pure word deafness can read and write normally, and the speech is usually normal.
What anatomical issues cause auditory verbal agnosia/ pure word deafness?
The damage in auditory area of the dominant hemisphere (superior temporal gyrus) that extends to the subcortical white matter
What is aphasia/ dysphasia?
The general problem in language ability (language comprehension, formulation and production in both spoken and written).
The problems are in which type of language functions in aphasia/ dysphasia?
Problems in central language functions (loss in central language ability)
Is aphasia/ dysphasia an acquired/ developmental issue?
Acquired disorder
What damage causes aphasia/ dysphasia?
Damage in various language-related regions
IN what situation is aphasia classification useful?
Clinical settings
What are the two prototypical aphasia?
Broca’s aphasia and Wernicke’s aphasia
What is the classification scheme of aphasia/ dysphasia based on?
Fluency, Comprehension and Repetition
What causes Broca’s aphasia?
Damage affecting Broca’s area
What is Broca’s aphasia?
- Impaired fluency, normal comprehension and impaired repetition
- Cannot produce language while can comprehend language
- Handwriting is affected
What causes Wernicke’s aphasia?
Damage affecting Wernicke’s area
What is Wernicke’s aphasia?
- normal fluency with impaired comprehension and impaired relation
- speech is empty, meaningless and full of nonsensical paraphasic errors
What is semantic paraphasia?
Produce speech with incorrect error and words (e.g. ink as pen)
What is phonemic paraphasia?
Says wrong words in terms of phonological errors (e.g. rot as rock)
What is global aphasia?
The most severe type of aphasia with impaired fluency, comprehension and repetition, which is a combination of Broca’s aphasia and Wernicke’s aphasia.
What is conduction aphasia?
- normal fluency, normal comprehension and impaired repetition
- speech is fluent but have impaired paraphasia errors and naming
- do not make errors in self-generating speech
What is conduction aphasia commonly misdiagnosed?
Wernicke’s aphasia
What causes conduction aphasia?
Damage in Peri-Sylvian area that interrupts accurate fasciculus
What are the three types of transcortical aphasia?
Transcortical motor aphasia, Transcortical sensory aphasia, and Mixed transcortical aphasia
What is transcortical motor aphasia?
Impaired fluency, normal comprehension and normal repetition, which is a mild form of Broca’s aphasia
What is transcortical sensory aphasia?
Impaired comprehension, normal fluency and normal repetition, which is a mild form of Wernicke’s aphasia
What is mixed transcortical aphasia?
Only impaired fluency and impaired comprehension, normal repetition, which is a mild form of global aphasia.
What is anomia/dysnomia?
Has difficulty in naming things
What causes anomia/ dysnomia?
It is caused by memory system and have heterogeneous causes
What is the most mild version of aphasia?
Anomia/ Dysnomia
What is dysarthria/ anarthria?
Inability to produce speech due to muscle issues
What type of disorder is dysarthria/ anarthria?
A motor speech disorder
What problems do people with dysarthria/ anarthria have
Unable to execute/ implement the articulation to produce speech (that requires connecting different elects together to produce speech)
How is the central language function for people with dysarthria/ anarthria?
Intact central language function
What causes dysarthria/ anarthria?
- muscles that are used to produce speech are damaged, paralysed or weakened
- dysfunction in neural muscular junctions
- dysfunction in cranial nerves
- dysfunction in motor cortex face area, cerebellum, basal ganglia, or descending corticobulbar pathways to the brainstem
How can you differentiate between dysarthria and Broca’s aphasia?
You can differentiate by pointing out the idea and asking if the idea you pont at is what the client is thinking of now.
- the patients who nod/ shake means that he has dysarthria as he can still answer for language
- broca’s aphasia patient cannot formulate the answer
What is verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
Impairment in planning and coordinating the complex movements for speech
What type of disorder is verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
Motor speech disorder
Are verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia developmental or acquired?
Dyspraxia: developmental
Apraxia: acquired
how are the central language functions of people with verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
Intact central language functions
What causes verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
Damages in the nervous system in terms of planning and coordinating
How is the brain in people with verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
The brain knows what it wants to say, but it cannot properly plan and sequence the required speech sound movements.
The evidence regarding the critical brian damage for verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia remains c______________.
Controversial
How is Broca’s aphasia different from verbal apraxia/ dyspraxia?
Verbal apraxia is a pure motor disorder while Broca’s aphasia involves language-related abilities.
What is stuttering?
It involves the interruption of flow with otherwise intact productions of intended words.
How is stuttering different from dysarthria and apraxia of speech?
There is no underlying weakness or paralysis of the articulatory musculature.
How will people with stuttering produce content if they have enough time?
If people are given enough time to produce the content, they can produce it like normal speech.
What is the performance of speech production and speech comprehension for people with stuttering?
They have normal speech production and normal comprehension on of speech while there is some errors in the flow of speech.
What causes stuttering? (Acquired or developmental?)
Neurogenic (Acquired) or Developmental
What is stuttering associated with?
Stuttering is proposed to be associated with impaired basal ganglia’s function in initiating and inhibiting speech movements and coordinating the timing.
What is stuttering unable to initiate or suppress?
Stuttering is unable to initiate the next word and unable to suppress the correct word
What is agraphia?
- An acquired disorder of spelling and writing (the visual for of language).
- Can still spell and write using keyboard but unable to do handwriting
What causes agraphia?
Neurological damage
How to distinguish agraphia from dysgraphia?
Dysgraphia usually refers to the learning disability characterised by writing difficulties, but sometimes dysgraphia can be used synonymously with agraphia.
What are the two subtypes of agraphia?
Central agraphia and Peripheral agraphia
What causes central agraphia?
Damage to the linguistic spelling route or the graphemic buffer
What happens to people with central agraphia?
- They cannot recall the visual pattern of words
- They have similar spelling deficits across all possible modalities of output (e.g. unable to write, spell, type and spell with anagram letters)
What causes peripheral agraphia?
The damage involves components located distal to the graphemic buffer.
What happens to people with peripheral agraphia?
- They can recall visual pattern of words
- Their selection and production of letters in handwriting is affected
What causes agraphia?
Damage in handwriting-related brain areas, which are widely distributed across cortical and subcortical areas
