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The present paper reinterprets aphasia relative to the divergent and convergent components of Guilford's model of behavior. It suggests that some aphasiologists have defined aphasia as a convergent semantic disorder. They have determined the presence or absence of an aphasic impairment on the basis of each individual's ability to recognize and reproduce previously learned material and to converge upon one correct answer. The present analysis also shows that there are a number of theoretical models of aphasia which indicate that aphasia involves more than a convergent semantic impairment. Aphasia, interpreted according to Guilford's model, appears to have a divergent component. Aphasia involves a decrease in an individual's ablilty to provide ideas in situations where a proliferation of ideas on some topic is required, or to extend the boundaries of what he already knows. The individual who is impaired in his ability to produce a number of relevant ideas and a variety of different kinds or categories of responses has a divergent semantic impairment.

The purpose of the present study was to examine the divergent semantic behaviors of 30 persons with aphasia in comparison to these same behaviors in a group of 30 normal individuals. Specifically, this study examined fluency or the number of ideas produced, flexibility or the variety of ideas produced, and communality within each subject group and between the two groups. Results support the existence of the divergent mental operation and indicate that persons with aphasia are impaired in their ability to generate semantic responses under this operation. Therefore, speech pathologists may wish to include divergent tasks in their evaluation procedures and plan therapy directed toward the retrieval of divergent responses.

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