Language and spatial reorientation: evidence from severe aphasia.
Investigating spatial cognition in individuals with acquired language impairments can inform our understanding of how components of language are involved in spatial representation. Using the reorientation paradigm of Hermer-Vazquez, Spelke, and Katsnelson (1999), we examined spatial cue integration (landmark-geometry conjunctions) in individuals with severe agrammatic or global aphasia and in a group of healthy older adults. Participants with aphasia performed similarly to healthy controls in the reorientation task, demonstrating the ability to integrate landmark and geometric cues, even during a concurrent verbal task designed to block access to any residual lexical resources. These results extend previous findings with healthy adults by suggesting that neither syntax nor lexicon is essential for spatial cue representation in a mature cognitive system, and provide further evidence that language deficits in aphasia can be independent from other domains of reasoning.
Bek
Judith
J
Department of Human Communication Sciences, University of Sheffield, Sheffield, United Kingdom.
Blades
Mark
M
Siegal
Michael
M
Varley
Rosemary
R
D000368:Aged; D001037:Aphasia / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000523:psychology; D001288:Attention; D003071:Cognition; D032882:Comprehension; D003463:Cues; D006801:Humans; D007802:Language; D007807:Language Tests; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009949:Orientation; D011597:Psychomotor Performance; D013028:Space Perception; D014705:Verbal Behavior