Lexical-semantic deficits following right hemisphere damage: evidence from verbal fluency tasks.
The evidence of lexical-semantic deficits following right, non-language-dominant hemisphere injury was assessed using word (or verbal) fluency tests. Two groups of subjects (non-brain-damaged controls and right hemisphere-damaged patients) were indistinguishable in their performances on convergent lexical tasks. Subjects completed verbal fluency tasks by five semantic criteria. The brain-damaged subjects produced significantly fewer responses on two of the categories and demonstrated fewer lexical retrieval strategies. The results were interpreted as evidence that lexical-semantic knowledge is largely intact following right-hemisphere damage, and that apparent lexical deficits result from failure to use lexical knowledge flexibility, suggesting that right-hemisphere language disorders may stem from broader cognitive failures.
Varley
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Department of Speech Science, University of Sheffield, UK.
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D001930:Brain Injuries / Q000150:complications*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007806:Language Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000209:etiology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D014705:Verbal Behavior