Affective prosody disorders in adults with neurological conditions: A scoping review.

BACKGROUND: Individuals with affective-prosodic deficits have difficulty understanding or expressing emotions and attitudes through prosody. Affective prosody disorders can occur in multiple neurological conditions, but the limited knowledge about the clinical groups prone to deficits complicates their identification in clinical settings. Additionally, the nature of the disturbance underlying affective prosody disorder observed in different neurological conditions remains poorly understood. AIMS: To bridge these knowledge gaps and provide relevant information to speech-language pathologists for the management of affective prosody disorders, this study provides an overview of research findings on affective-prosodic deficits in adults with neurological conditions by answering two questions: (1) Which clinical groups present with acquired affective prosodic impairments following brain damage? (2) Which aspects of affective prosody comprehension and production are negatively affected in these neurological conditions? METHODS & PROCEDURES: We conducted a scoping review following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses Extension for Scoping Reviews guidelines. A literature search was undertaken in five electronic databases (MEDLINE, PsycINFO, EMBASE, CINAHL and Linguistics, and Language Behavior Abstracts) to identify primary studies reporting affective prosody disorders in adults with neurological impairments. We extracted data on clinical groups and characterised their deficits based on the assessment task used. OUTCOMES & RESULTS: The review of 98 studies identified affective-prosodic deficits in 17 neurological conditions. The task paradigms typically used in affective prosody research (discrimination, recognition, cross-modal integration, production on request, imitation and spontaneous production) do not target the processes underlying affective prosody comprehension and production. Therefore, based on the current state of knowledge, it is not possible to establish the level of processing at which impairment occurs in clinical groups. Nevertheless, deficits in the comprehension of affective prosody are observed in 14 clinical groups (mainly recognition deficits) and deficits in the production of affective prosody (either on request or spontaneously) in 10 clinical groups. Neurological conditions and types of deficits that have not been investigated in many studies are highlighted. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: The aim of this scoping review was to provide an overview on acquired affective prosody disorders and to identify gaps in knowledge that warrant further investigation. Deficits in the comprehension or production of affective prosody are common to numerous clinical groups with various neurological conditions. However, the underlying cause of affective prosody disorders across them is still unknown. Future studies should implement standardised assessment methods with specific tasks based on a cognitive model to identify the underlying deficits of affective prosody disorders. WHAT THIS PAPER ADDS: What is already known on the subject What is already known on the subjectAffective prosody is used to share emotions and attitudes through speech and plays a fundamental role in communication and social interactions. Affective prosody disorders can occur in various neurological conditions, but the limited knowledge about the clinical groups prone to affective-prosodic deficits and about the characteristics of different phenotypes of affective prosody disorders complicates their identification in clinical settings. Distinct abilities underlying the comprehension and production of affective prosody can be selectively impaired by brain damage, but the nature of the disturbance underlying affective prosody disorders in different neurological conditions remains unclear. What this study adds Affective-prosodic deficits are reported in 17 neurological conditions, despite being recognised as a core feature of the clinical profile in only a few of them. The assessment tasks typically used in affective prosody research do not provide accurate information about the specific neurocognitive processes impaired in the comprehension or production of affective prosody. Future studies should implement assessment methods based on a cognitive approach to identify underlying deficits. The assessment of cognitive/executive dysfunctions, motor speech impairment and aphasia might be important for distinguishing primary affective prosodic dysfunctions from those secondarily impacting affective prosody. What are the potential clinical implications of this study? Raising awareness about the possible presence of affective-prosodic disorders in numerous clinical groups will facilitate their recognition by speech-language pathologists and, consequently, their management in clinical settings. A comprehensive assessment covering multiple affective-prosodic skills could highlight specific aspects of affective prosody that warrant clinical intervention.

Noninvasive stimulation of the unlesioned hemisphere and phonological treatment in a case of chronic anomia post-stroke.

Chronic lexical anomia after left hemisphere (LH) stroke improves under personalized phonological treatment (PT). Cortical linking between language and hand motor areas (hand_M1) questioned whether PT-related improvement relies on the unlesioned hemisphere (UH) plasticity when LH is dysfunctional. Our 70-yo-woman case study showed that 10 sessions of excitatory stimulation of UH_hand-M1 combined with PT hastened oral picture naming improvement as compared to sham+PT and changes were maintained together with changes of untrained items andcorticomotor excitability increase. This supports a role of stimulation-induced plasticity of UH_hand M1 in language recovery, at least in the improvement of lexical anomia in chronic stroke.

Speech rate increase in primary progressive apraxia of speech and its cost on articulatory accuracy.

Impaired articulation (e.g., articulatory accuracy) and prosody (e.g., slow speech rate) are considered primary diagnostic criterions for apraxia of speech both in neurodegenerative and post-stroke contexts. The primary aim of this study was to investigate the ability of participants with primary progressive apraxia of speech (PPAOS), a neurodegenerative disease characterised by initially isolated progressive apraxia of speech, to increase speech rate and the interaction between articulatory accuracy and speech rate. The secondary aim was to investigate the effect of syllable frequency and structure on this interaction. Four speakers with PPAOS, and four sex- and age-matched healthy speakers (HS) read eight two-syllable words embedded two times in a ten-syllable carrier phrase. Syllable frequency and structure were manipulated for the first syllable of the target words and controlled for the second syllable. All sentences were produced at three different target speech rates (conditions): habitual, regular (five syllables/second), and fast (seven syllables/second). Prosodic measures for target words and sentences were computed based on acoustic analysis of speech rate. Articulatory measures for words and sentences were rated based on a perceptual assessment of articulatory accuracy. Results show slower speech rate and reduced articulatory accuracy in speakers with PPAOS compared to HS. Results suggest that speakers with PPAOS also have limited ability to increase their speech rate. Finally, results suggest that articulatory complexity influences speech rate but that the cost of speech rate increase on articulatory accuracy varies greatly across speakers with PPAOS and is not necessarily related to the extent of the increase when measured in a highly structured sentence production task. Theoretical and clinical implications of these findings are discussed.

Intensive and non-intensive treatment of lexical anomia are equally efficient in post-stroke aphasia.

Although the treatment for lexical anomia in individuals with aphasia (IWA) was shown effective, little is known about the optimal treatment intensity required. The aim of this study was to verify whether intensive and non-intensive treatments led to different outcomes when parameters of intensity are rigorously controlled. Six IWA with post-stroke lexical anomia received phonological treatment at two distinct frequencies: intensive (four times a week) and non-intensive (once a week). Results showed that both treatments were equally effective. This finding is especially relevant in contexts in which speech-language therapy delivery services are limited.

Progressive apraxia of speech in Quebec French speakers: A case series.

BACKGROUND: The term progressive apraxia of speech (PAOS) is used to describe speakers presenting with isolated or dominant apraxia of speech in the context of a neurodegenerative syndrome, including primary progressive apraxia of speech (PPAOS) and dominant progressive apraxia of speech (DAOS), respectively. Its motor speech profile has been increasingly explored in the last decade, but description remains vague and very English oriented, although the effect of speakers' language on motor speech phenotypes is increasingly recognized. Although some studies suggest that speakers presenting with isolated PAOS (PPAOS) versus dominant PAOS with concomitant aphasia (DAOS) should be differentiated, distinct characteristics of the two presentations are unclear. Furthermore, a careful description of their clinical presentation in languages other than English is required. AIMS: To describe the motor speech characteristics of Quebec French-speaking participants with prominent PAOS and to explore the communication profile of those presenting more specifically with isolated PAOS (PPAOS), and with dominant PAOS and concomitant aphasia (DAOS). METHODS & PROCEDURES: A thorough effort to recruit all speakers presenting with PAOS in the larger population areas of the province of Quebec was conducted over a 3-year span. A total of nine participants with PAOS (pwPAOS; PPAOS = 5, DAOS = 4) underwent a comprehensive language and motor speech assessment, and a cognitive screening. Their performance was compared with 30 matched healthy controls. OUTCOMES & RESULTS: As a group, pwPAOS differed from healthy speakers on all acoustic and perceptual measures. The PPAOS and PAOS subgroups were similar on several measures, but participants from the PPAOS subgroup tended to perform better on articulatory measures and maximum speech rate tasks. CONCLUSIONS & IMPLICATIONS: This study provides an in-depth analysis of motor speech characteristics of PAOS in Quebec French speakers and adds further evidence for the differentiation of PPAOS and DAOS. Combining simple perceptual and acoustic analyses represent a promising approach to distinguish the two variants and identify treatment targets. What this paper adds What is already known on this subject Progressive apraxia of speech (PAOS) is a neurodegenerative syndrome characterized by progressive and initially isolated or dominant apraxia of speech (primary progressive apraxia of speech [PPAOS] and dominant progressive apraxia of speech [DAOS], respectively). Studies mostly report articulatory and prosodic deficits in PAOS, but concomitant deficits such as dysarthria and executive dysfunction are also reported. The description of motor speech skills in PAOS remains vague and English-oriented. Studies suggest that speakers presenting with isolated PAOS vs dominant PAOS with concomitant aphasia should be differentiated, but distinct characteristics of the two presentations are unclear. What this study adds to existing knowledge To the best of the authors' knowledge, this study is the first to report transversal data of Quebec-French participants with PPAOS and DAOS. Moreover, this study is a first step towards identifying potential characteristics that could facilitate the diagnosis of PPAOS and DAOS in Quebec French. It makes a significant contribution to our understanding of progressive apraxia of speech in different cultural languages. What are the potential or actual clinical implications of this work? This study also initiates the search for sensitive tasks for the diagnosis of those speakers (which is an important process), in addition to identifying the core characteristics of PAOS, DAOS, and PPAOS in the development of an assessment battery for this population.

Performance on the Boston Naming Test in Bilinguals.

OBJECTIVES: We examined performance on the Boston Naming Test (BNT) in older and younger adults who were monolingual English or French speakers, or bilingual speakers of English and French (n=215). METHODS: Monolingual participants completed the task in their native language, and bilingual participants completed the task in English, French, and bilingual (either-language) administrations. RESULTS: Overall, younger and older monolingual French speakers performed worse than other groups; bilingual participants performed worst in the French administration and approximately two-thirds of bilingual participants performed better when responses were accepted in either language. Surprisingly, however, a subset of bilinguals performed worse when responses were accepted in either language as compared to their maximum score achieved in either English or French. This either-language disadvantage does not appear to be associated with the degree of balanced bilingualism, but instead appears to be related to overall naming abilities. Differential item analysis comparing language groups and the different administrations identified several items that displayed uniform and/or non-uniform differential item functioning (DIF). CONCLUSIONS: The BNT does not elicit equivalent performance in English and French, even when assessing naming performance in monolingual French speakers using the French version of the test. Scores were lower in French overall, and several items exhibited DIF. We recommend caution in interpreting performance on these items in bilingual speakers. Finally, not all bilinguals benefit from an either-language administration of the BNT.

When the Wedding March becomes sad: Semantic memory impairment for music in the semantic variant of primary progressive aphasia.

Music can induce particular emotions and activate semantic knowledge. In the semantic variant of primary progressive aphasia (svPPA), semantic memory is impaired as a result of anterior temporal lobe (ATL) atrophy. Semantics is responsible for the encoding and retrieval of factual knowledge about music, including associative and emotional attributes. In the present study, we report the performance of two individuals with svPPA in three experiments. NG with bilateral ATL atrophy and ND with atrophy largely restricted to the left ATL. Experiment 1 assessed the recognition of musical excerpts and both patients were unimpaired. Experiment 2 studied the emotions conveyed by music and only NG showed impaired performance. Experiment 3 tested the association of semantic concepts to musical excerpts and both patients were impaired. These results suggest that the right ATL seems essential for the recognition of emotions conveyed by music and that the left ATL is involved in binding music to semantics. They are in line with the notion that the ATLs are devoted to the binding of different modality-specific properties and suggest that they are also differentially involved in the processing of factual and emotional knowledge associated with music.

Intermittent Theta-Burst Stimulation of the Right Dorsolateral Prefrontal Cortex to Promote Metaphor Comprehension in Parkinson Disease: A Case Study.

This single-case research-designed study explored whether intermittent theta-burst stimulation (iTBS) of the right dorsolateral prefrontal cortex (DLPFC) could improve metaphor comprehension in people with Parkinson disease (PD) and language impairments. A right-handed participant with PD diagnosed 9 years ago, receiving long-term treatment with levodopa, and with metaphor comprehension impairment was recruited to undergo 10 sessions of sham stimulation (in 2wk), a washout period (6wk), and then 10 sessions of iTBS (in 2wk). Clinical scores of metaphor comprehension and motor evaluation (Unified Parkinson Disease Rating Scale part III) and transcranial magnetic stimulation to test the excitability of the primary motor cortex (M1) were used at baseline, postsham, post-iTBS, and at 3 follow-ups (8, 14, and 20wk post-iTBS). Metaphor comprehension was improved after iTBS, and the highest scores were obtained 8 weeks later (P=.01). This improvement was correlated with the increase of the right M1 excitability (r=-.86, P=.03) and with the decrease of transcallosal inhibition latency from the left to the right hemisphere (r=-.88, P=.02). Sham yielded no effect (P>.05). Administration of iTBS over the right DLPFC improved metaphor comprehension likely by a long-term influence on brain synaptic plasticity, including improvement of interhemispheric dialogue. More studies are warranted to confirm these findings in larger samples of participants with PD.

The Quebec Semantic Memory Battery: Development, Standardization, and Psychometric Assessment of a Semantic Memory Battery in French.

OBJECTIVE: People with aphasia often experience semantic memory (SM) impairment. To improve diagnostic outcomes, SM tasks should recruit various sensory input channels (oral, written, and pictographic), permitting accessible, complete evaluation. There is a need for SM batteries for French-speaking Quebecers that use multiple input channels. The present study, therefore, describes the development of a novel French-language semantic battery: la Batterie québécoise de la mémoire sémantique (BQMS), the assessment of the BQMS's psychometric properties, and the establishment of normative data for the BQMS. METHOD: We first developed eight SM tasks. Following a pilot validation study, we determined the BQMS's reliability and validity, to ensure consistent, accurate detection of SM impairment. Among French-speaking Quebecers with cerebrovascular aphasia (n = 10), people with the semantic variant of Primary Progressive Aphasia (n = 4), and healthy controls (n = 14), we examined its convergent validity, concurrent validity, test-retest reliability, and internal consistency. Finally, we established normative data for the BQMS by calculating cut-off scores per task that indicate SM impairment (in 93 cognitively healthy French-speaking Quebecers), stratified by sociodemographic variables associated with performance. RESULTS: The BQMS shows high concurrent, discriminant, and convergent validity, as well as good test-retest reliability and internal consistency. The cut-off score indicating SM impairment ranged from the 2nd to 25th percentiles (stratified by task, age, and sex). CONCLUSIONS: The BQMS's psychometric properties indicate that it could be a valuable clinical tool for detecting SM impairment. Our normative data will help clinicians detect such impairments.

The heterogeneity of cognitive symptoms in Parkinson's disease: a meta-analysis.

Several studies have reported heterogeneity in cognitive symptoms associated with specific characteristics of patients with Parkinson's disease (PD). Indeed, researchers have characterised subtypes of patients suffering from PD according to various criteria. Those most frequently used are the type of predominant motor symptoms (tremors or non-tremor symptoms), age at onset and presence of depression. Some characteristics, like the predominant motor subtypes, as well as the presence of depression, are more widely used to categorise cognitive differences between patients. The goal of this study was to analyse the impact of the type of predominant motor symptoms and depression on cognition in PD. A meta-analysis of 27 studies (from 1989 to 2012) was carried out to calculate the average effect size of these factors on the most often used cognitive test during those past years to evaluate cognitive skills, the Mini-Mental State Examination. The studies analysed showed significant mean weighted effect sizes on cognition for the type of motor symptoms (d=0.42; 95% CI 0.30 to 0.54) and for depression (d=0.52; 95% CI 0.38 to 0.66). These results suggested that PD participants with non-tremor predominant motor symptoms or with depression had more or more severe cognitive impairments. Identification of different subtypes in PD is important for a better understanding of the cognitive symptoms associated with this disease. Better knowing the impact of different features of PD subgroups could help to design more appropriate treatments for patients with PD.

The impacts of aging on the comprehension of affective prosody: A systematic review.

Recent clinical reports have suggested a possible decline in the ability to understand emotions in speech (affective prosody comprehension) with aging. The present study aims to further examine the differences in performance between older and younger adults in terms of affective prosody comprehension. Following a recent cognitive model dividing affective prosody comprehension into perceptual and lexico-semantic components, a cognitive approach targeting these components was adopted. The influence of emotions' valence and category on aging performance was also investigated. A systematic review of the literature was carried out using six databases. Twenty-one articles, presenting 25 experiments, were included. All experiments analyzed affective prosody comprehension performance of older versus younger adults. The results confirmed that older adults' performance in identifying emotions in speech was reduced compared to younger adults. The results also brought out the fact that affective prosody comprehension abilities could be modulated by the emotion category but not by the emotional valence. Various theories account for this difference in performance, namely auditory perception, brain aging, and socioemotional selectivity theory suggesting that older people tend to neglect negative emotions. However, the explanation of the underlying deficits of the affective prosody decline is still limited.

Use of smartphones and tablets after acquired brain injury to support cognition.

OBJECTIVES: To describe the use of mobile devices after acquired brain injury (ABI), from the perspectives of injured individuals and significant others, and to examine factors associated with mobile device use for cognition. METHODS: Cross-sectional study with 50 adults with moderate/severe traumatic brain injury or stroke (42% women; mean of 50.7 years old, 4.6 years post-ABI), and 24 significant others. Participants completed questionnaires on mobile technology, cognitive functioning and the impact of technology. RESULTS: Of 45/50 adults with ABI who owned a smartphone/tablet, 31% reported difficulties in using their device post-injury, 44% had received support, and 46% were interested in further training. Significant others reported motor/visual impairments and the fear of becoming dependent on technology as barriers for mobile device use, and 65% mentioned that their injured relative needed additional support. Mobile device use for cognition was common (64%), predicted in a regression model by lower subjective memory and more positive perception of the psychosocial impacts of technology, and also associated in univariate analyses with younger age, lower executive functioning, and greater use of memory strategies. CONCLUSION: Using mobile devices for cognition is common post-ABI but remains challenging for a significant proportion. Developing training approaches may help supporting technology use.IMPLICATIONS FOR REHABILITATIONUsing mobile electronic devices (smartphones and tablets) is common after acquired brain injury (ABI) but is challenging for a significant proportion of individuals.After the ABI, close to 50% of individuals receive support in using their mobile device, mostly from family members and friends, but rarely from rehabilitation clinicians or technology specialists.In a sample of 50 adults with ABI, more frequent use of mobile devices to support cognition was associated with poorer subjective memory and executive functioning, greater use of memory strategies, more positive perception of the psychosocial impacts of technology, and younger age.

Assessment of semantic memory in mild cognitive impairment: The psychometric properties of a novel semantic battery.

Semantic memory is stable in healthy older adults but shows decline in mild cognitive impairment (MCI). Current measures of semantic function do not assess multiple aspects of semantic function and/or are time-consuming to administer. Here we report the psychometric properties of a battery to detect semantic impairment that we recently developed and published. Study 1 determined the face validity of the battery; interviews were conducted with five professionals with expertise in MCI and language. Face validity interviews suggested the battery appropriately assesses semantic impairments. Study 2 assessed convergent validity and reliability (inter-rater reliability, test-retest reliability, and internal consistency). Participants included 102 healthy older adults and 60 people with MCI who completed a four-task semantic battery. Results demonstrate that performance on the semantic battery correlates with traditional measures of semantic function, inter-rater reliability and internal consistency was high, and there was no significant change in mean scores between participants' first and second testing sessions. The present findings suggest that the semantic battery is a reliable and valid assessment of semantic function. It is currently recommended for research use only.

Rehabilitation of asyntactic comprehension in post-stroke aphasic individuals: A systematic review of the literature / Rééducation de la compréhension asyntaxique chez les personnes aphasiques post-accident vasculaire cérébral : une revue systématique de la littérature

Asyntactic comprehension corresponds to a disorder in the comprehension of sentences, which is one of the difficulties that can arise in a context of aphasia following a stroke. To date, rehabilitation of asyntactic comprehension is divided into three main groups of approaches, centered on the structure of the sentence, on the memory or on the verb and its thematic roles. The present study aims to assess the effectiveness of the existing treatments to rehabilitate asyntactic comprehension in post-stroke aphasic individuals, in terms of post-treatment improvements, generalization, long-term maintenance and transfer effects to daily life activities. A systematic review of the literature was carried out and twenty-four studies presenting seven different treatments, were selected, involving a total of 148 post-stroke aphasic patients. The methodological quality of each study has been analyzed following the Santiago-Delefosse grid or the MMAT grid. In general, the analysis of the measures of effectiveness (post-treatment improvement, generalization, maintenance, and transfer effects) showed that the treatments whose approach was centered on the structure of the sentence or on the working memory are those allowing to significantly improve syntactic comprehension for individuals with aphasia. The short-term memory approach did not show improvement in syntactic comprehension but remains little studied. And the approach based on the verb and its thematic roles is so far too understudied to draw a clear conclusion. The present study contributes to the advancement of knowledge on syntactic rehabilitation in the context of post-stroke aphasia leadind to various clinical implications for an informed choice. The few studies available on the subject as well as the few data collected constitute, among other things, a limit to this study.

La compréhension asyntaxique correspond à un trouble de la compréhension de phrases dans le cadre d'une aphasie faisant suite à un accident vasculaire cérébral (AVC). À ce jour, les approches de la rééducation de la compréhension asyntaxique se répartissent selon qu'elles sont centrées sur la structure de la phrase, sur la mémoire ou sur le verbe. La présente étude vise à évaluer l'efficacité de ces approches pour améliore la compréhension asyntaxique chez ces personnes. Après une revue systématique de la littérature, un total de 24 études présentant sept traitements différents et regroupant 148 patients ont été sélectionnées. L'analyse des mesures d'efficacité (amélioration post-traitement, généralisation, maintien et transfert) a montré que les traitements dont l'approche est centrée sur la structure de la phrase ou sur la mémoire de travail ont permis d'améliorer significativement la compréhension syntaxique. Le traitement basé sur la mémoire à court terme n'a pas montré d'amélioration de la compréhension syntaxique mais reste peu étudié et le traitement axé sur le verbe est à ce jour trop peu étudié pour tirer une conclusion claire. La présente étude contribue à l'avancement des connaissances sur la rééducation syntaxique bien que plus d'études soient nécessaires pour augmenter les données à jour.

Normative Data for Healthy French-Speaking Persons Aged 80 Years and Older for the DTLA Language Screening Test.

The Detection Test for Language Impairments in Adults and the Aged (DTLA) is a quick, sensitive, and standardized screening test designed to assess language disorders in adults and elderly people. The test was specifically developed to detect linguistic impairment associated with major neurocognitive disorders. In 2017, we established normative data on 545 healthy individuals between 50 and 80 years old from four French-speaking countries: Belgium, Canada (Quebec), France, and Switzerland. OBJECTIVE: The objective of the present study was to develop norms for the population older than 80 years of age for the DTLA. METHOD: We extend the original normative data to include 149 healthy, community-dwelling, French-speaking adults aged 80 years old and older from the same countries. RESULTS: For the total score of the screening test, we calculated the 5th, 15th, 25th, and 50th percentiles for two education groups. The analyses allowed the identification of cutoff and alert scores based on education level. CONCLUSIONS: With the present study, solid normative data for the DTLA derived from the performance of 694 healthy, community-dwelling adults, and elderly people are now available to clinicians and researchers.

Emotional speech processing: disentangling the effects of prosody and semantic cues.

To inform how emotions in speech are implicitly processed and registered in memory, we compared how emotional prosody, emotional semantics, and both cues in tandem prime decisions about conjoined emotional faces. Fifty-two participants rendered facial affect decisions (Pell, 2005a), indicating whether a target face represented an emotion (happiness or sadness) or not (a facial grimace), after passively listening to happy, sad, or neutral prime utterances. Emotional information from primes was conveyed by: (1) prosody only; (2) semantic cues only; or (3) combined prosody and semantic cues. Results indicated that prosody, semantics, and combined prosody-semantic cues facilitate emotional decisions about target faces in an emotion-congruent manner. However, the magnitude of priming did not vary across tasks. Our findings highlight that emotional meanings of prosody and semantic cues are systematically registered during speech processing, but with similar effects on associative knowledge about emotions, which is presumably shared by prosody, semantics, and faces.

BEPS: Development, validation, and normative data of a sentence production test in French.

Assessing one's sentence production ability can help to identify difficulties experienced by individuals with aphasia and enables targeted intervention. Speech-language pathologists working with the francophone population must contend with the current lack of a sentence production evaluation tool. The aim of this article is to present the development, validation, and normative data of a French-language test used to evaluate the production of sentences: the BEPS (Batterie d'Évaluation de la Production Syntaxique). The BEPS includes four tasks based on Bock and Levelt's model of sentence production, namely (1) Verb Naming Task, (2) Verb Inflection Task, (3) Constituent Assembly Task, and (4) Thematic Role Assignment Task. For each task, various psycholinguistic parameters were controlled or manipulated. The BEPS had good content and construct validity, excellent test-retest reliability and good internal consistency. This battery fulfills the current needs for clinical tool in the francophone population when assessing sentence production capacities. Normative data are presented for individuals 19-79 years of age (n = 191). Raw scores were converted to percentiles for each task. The BEPS represents significant assistance to help clinicians identify the origins of the syntactic production deficits of patients with poststroke and degenerative diseases.

Heterogeneity of repetition abilities in logopenic variant primary progressive aphasia.

The differential diagnosis of primary progressive aphasia (PPA) is challenging due to overlapping clinical manifestations of the different variants of the disease. This is particularly true for the logopenic variant of PPA (lvPPA), in which such overlap was reported with regard to impairments in repetition abilities. In this study, four individuals with lvPPA underwent standard neuropsychological and language assessments. The influence of psycholinguistic variables on their performance of in word, nonword and sentence repetition tasks was also specifically explored. Some level of heterogeneity was found in cognitive functions and in language. The four participants showed impairment in sentence repetition in which their performance was negatively affected by semantic reversibility and syntactic complexity. This study supports the heterogeneity of lvPPA with respect to the cognitive and linguistic status of participants. It also shows that sentence repetition is influenced not only by length, but also by semantic reversibility and syntactic complexity, two psycholinguistic variables known to place additional demands on phonological working memory.

O diagnóstico diferencial da afasia progressiva primária (APP) é desafiador devido às sobreposições das manifestações clínicas das diferentes variantes da doença. Isso é particularmente verdadeiro para a variante logopênica do APP (APPlg), em que tal sobreposição foi relatada em relação à deficiências nas habilidades de repetição. No presente estudo, quatro indivíduos com APPlg foram submetidos à avaliações neuropsicológica e de linguagem. A influência de variáveis psicolinguísticas em seu desempenho de palavras, não-palavras e tarefas de repetição de frases também foi especificamente explorada. Certo nível de heterogeneidade foi encontrado nas funções cognitivas e na linguagem. Os quatro participantes apresentaram prejuízo na repetição de frases em que seu desempenho foi afetado negativamente pela reversibilidade semântica e complexidade sintática. O estudo apoia a heterogeneidade do APPlg no que diz respeito ao status cognitivo e linguístico dos participantes. Mostra também que a repetição de sentenças é influenciada não apenas pelo comprimento, mas também pela reversibilidade semântica e complexidade sintática, duas variáveis psicolinguísticas conhecidas por colocarem demandas adicionais na memória operacional fonológica.

A Preliminary Look Into the Clinical Evolution of Motor Speech Characteristics in Primary Progressive Apraxia of Speech in Québec French.

Purpose This study aimed to track changes in acoustical and perceptual features of motor speech in patients with phonetic and prosodic primary progressive apraxia of speech (PPAOS) in Québec French over an 18-month period. Method A prospective multiple-case series with multiple testing periods, including four participants with a diagnosis of PPAOS, was conducted. Participants were 0.5-4 years postonset of disease at baseline. They underwent comprehensive motor speech and language assessments and cognitive screening every 6 months for up to 18 months. Acoustical and perceptual analyses of motor speech were conducted. Results Results showed a considerable impairment in motor speech abilities for patients with PPAOS at all time points and a significant decrease in performance for almost all articulatory and prosodic measures over time. Passage reading and diadochokinesis seemed particularly promising for the tracking of changes in PPAOS motor speech characteristics and PPAOS classification. Quantifying length of speech runs made it possible to distinguish phonetic from prosodic PPAOS. Finally, the patients who evolved to phonetic PPAOS developed aphasia, and the two with prosodic PPAOS showed greater motor symptoms such as unequivocal dysarthria. Conclusion This study extends the growing literature on PPAOS and its subtypes by describing specific changes in articulatory and prosodic abilities over a period of at least 6 months, which are important for the diagnosis and management of PPAOS.

The role of the left anterior temporal lobe in the semantic processing of famous faces.

Neuroimaging studies on healthy subjects have reported the involvement of the bilateral anterior temporal lobes (ATL) in recognizing known people. While the role of the right ATL in the semantic processing of known people is accepted, it is still matter of debate whether left ATL is implicated in the name retrieval or in the access to semantic information. In the present fMRI study, we modulated the level of specificity of the semantic categorization task of famous face stimuli in order to map the brain regions involved in the specific semantic processing controlling for automatic name access. Specifically, participants (n = 12, mean age = 23.0+/-1.7 years, F/M = 8/4) were asked to determine whether the stimulus photograph matched with the label of the profession category. Since the same set of stimuli was used for both specific and general conditions, contrasting these two conditions controlled for the activation due to the automatic access to the name of famous persons. Results showed that: 1) the right ATL was activated by a semantic categorization task of famous face stimuli at both general and specific level; 2) while controlling for the activation due to the automatic name retrieval, the left ATL showed increased activation during the specific categorization task; 3) the specificity of the semantic processing increased strength of connections towards the left ATL from the right lateral fusiform gyrus, devoted to the visual processing of faces, and from the right ATL. These findings support the idea of a crucial role of the left anterior temporal lobe in the processing of person-specific semantic information.