Aphasia tests reconsidered

Unexpected brain-language relationships in aphasia: Evidence from transcortical sensory aphasia associated with frontal lobe lesions

“…spontaneous speech, auditory comprehension) to provide every patient with a taxonomic diagnosis of aphasia according to the traditional classification schema (e.g. Benson & Geschwind, 1971;Kertesz, 1982) rather than to elucidate the nature of the language disorder (Byng et al, 1990;Walker, 1992). Therefore, a detailed investigation of single-case studies is needed to detect subtle yet theoretically robust differences in language performance in these patient groups.…”

Relevance is in the eye and ear of the beholder: An example from populations with a neurological impairment

“…This notion is especially pertinent in light of the fact that most of the currently used tests with populations with a neurological impairment use a ''trained'' hearer's subjective interpretation of conversational competence as a measure of a speaker's ability to make relevant contributions (Byng, Kay, Edmundson, & Scott, 1990;Manochiopinig, Sheard, & Reed, 1992). Traditional aphasia tests such as the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Examination (Goodglass & Kaplan, 1983), the Western Aphasia Battery (Kertesz, 1982), the Protocole Montre  al-Toulouse d'examen linguistique de l'aphasie (Nespoulous et al, 1992) and the Minnesota Test for Differential Diagnosis of Aphasia (Schuell, 1965) all include sections where conversational discourse (often in interview format) is subjectively rated for informational content and relevance.…”

The Palpa: A commentary and consideration of the clinical implications

“…They supply information about which language processes may be impaired and which are intact and this, in turn, can help the clinician identify a target for therapy. Yet, of itself, this level of hypothesizing does not constitute the theory of intervention (Byng et al 1990). Such a theory must also take account of factors outside the strict cognitive assessment.…”