In aphasia,a person may be unable to comprehend or unable to formulate language because of damage to specific brain regions. The major causes are stroke and head trauma;prevalence is hard to determine but aphasia due to stroke is estimated to be 0.1–0.4% in the Global North. Aphasia can also be the result of brain tumors,epilepsy,brain damage and brain infections,or neurodegenerative diseases.
Wernicke's aphasia,also known as receptive aphasia,sensory aphasia or posterior aphasia,is a type of aphasia in which individuals have difficulty understanding written and spoken language. Patients with Wernicke's aphasia demonstrate fluent speech,which is characterized by typical speech rate,intact syntactic abilities and effortless speech output. Writing often reflects speech in that it tends to lack content or meaning. In most cases,motor deficits do not occur in individuals with Wernicke's aphasia. Therefore,they may produce a large amount of speech without much meaning. Individuals with Wernicke's aphasia are typically unaware of their errors in speech and do not realize their speech may lack meaning. They typically remain unaware of even their most profound language deficits.
A communication disorder is any disorder that affects an individual's ability to comprehend,detect,or apply language and speech to engage in dialogue effectively with others. The delays and disorders can range from simple sound substitution to the inability to understand or use one's native language.
The National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD),a member of the U.S. National Institutes of Health,is mandated to conduct and support biomedical and behavioral research and research training in the normal and disordered processes of hearing,balance,smell,taste,voice,speech,and language. The institute also conducts and supports research and research training related to disease prevention and health promotion;addresses special biomedical and behavioral problems associated with people who have communication impairments or disorders;and supports efforts to create devices which substitute for lost and impaired sensory and communication function.
Transcortical motor aphasia (TMoA),also known as commissural dysphasia or white matter dysphasia,results from damage in the anterior superior frontal lobe of the language-dominant hemisphere. This damage is typically due to cerebrovascular accident (CVA). TMoA is generally characterized by reduced speech output,which is a result of dysfunction of the affected region of the brain. The left hemisphere is usually responsible for performing language functions,although left-handed individuals have been shown to perform language functions using either their left or right hemisphere depending on the individual. The anterior frontal lobes of the language-dominant hemisphere are essential for initiating and maintaining speech. Because of this,individuals with TMoA often present with difficulty in speech maintenance and initiation.
Speech is a human vocal communication using language. Each language uses phonetic combinations of vowel and consonant sounds that form the sound of its words,and using those words in their semantic character as words in the lexicon of a language according to the syntactic constraints that govern lexical words' function in a sentence. In speaking,speakers perform many different intentional speech acts,e.g.,informing,declaring,asking,persuading,directing,and can use enunciation,intonation,degrees of loudness,tempo,and other non-representational or paralinguistic aspects of vocalization to convey meaning. In their speech,speakers also unintentionally communicate many aspects of their social position such as sex,age,place of origin,physical states,psychological states,physico-psychological states,education or experience,and the like.
Language disorders or language impairments are disorders that involve the processing of linguistic information. Problems that may be experienced can involve grammar,semantics (meaning),or other aspects of language. These problems may be receptive,expressive,or a combination of both. Examples include specific language impairment,better defined as developmental language disorder,or DLD,and aphasia,among others. Language disorders can affect both spoken and written language,and can also affect sign language;typically,all forms of language will be impaired.
The American Speech–Language–Hearing Association (ASHA) is a professional association for speech–language pathologists,audiologists,and speech,language,and hearing scientists in the United States and internationally. It has more than 218,000 members and affiliates.
The All India Institute of Speech and Hearing,commonly known as AIISH (AYE-SH),is located in Manasagangotri,Mysore,India. It is an autonomous institute under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare. The institute was established in 1966 with a focus on training professionals for speech and hearing sciences.
Speech-language pathology is a field of healthcare expertise practiced globally. Speech-language pathology (SLP) specializes in the evaluation,diagnosis,treatment,and prevention of communication disorders,cognitive-communication disorders,voice disorders,pragmatic disorders,social communication difficulties and swallowing disorder across the lifespan. It is an independent profession considered an "allied health profession" or allied health profession by professional bodies like the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) and Speech Pathology Australia. Allied health professions include audiology,optometry,occupational therapy,rehabilitation psychology,physical therapy and others.
Muteness or mutism is defined as an absence of speech while conserving or maintaining the ability to hear the speech of others. Mutism is typically understood as a person's inability to speak,and commonly observed by their family members,caregivers,teachers,doctors or speech and language pathologists. It may not be a permanent condition,as muteness can be caused or manifest due to several different phenomena,such as physiological injury,illness,medical side effects,psychological trauma,developmental disorders,or neurological disorders. A specific physical disability or communication disorder can be more easily diagnosed. Loss of previously normal speech (aphasia) can be due to accidents,disease,or surgical complication;it is rarely for psychological reasons.
Speech and language impairment are basic categories that might be drawn in issues of communication involve hearing,speech,language,and fluency.
Ingo R. Titze is a voice scientist and executive director of the National Center for Voice and Speech and Adjunct Professor in the Department of Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgery at the University of Utah in Salt Lake City. He also teaches at the Summer Vocology Institute,also housed at the University of Utah. He is a Distinguished Professor at the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at the University of Iowa and has written several books relating to the human voice.
Sandra Bond Chapman is a cognitive neuroscientist,founder and chief director of the Center for Brain Health,Dee Wyly Distinguished Professor in Brain Health,and a professor in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences at The University of Texas at Dallas.
Caroline Bowen is a speech pathologist who was born in New Zealand,and who has lived and worked in Australia most of her life. She specialises in children's speech sound disorders. Her clinical career as a speech-language pathologist spanned 42 years from 1970 to 2011.
Susan Ellis Weismer is a language and communication scientist known for her work on language development in children with specific language impairment and autism spectrum disorder (ASD). She is the Oros Family Chair and Professor of Communication Sciences and Disorders at the University of Wisconsin–Madison,where she is a Principal Investigator and Director of the Language Processes Lab. She has also served as the Associate Dean for Research,College of Letters and Sciences at the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Lisa Lynn Cunningham is an American scientist. She is Scientific Director and a senior investigator of sensory cell biology at the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD).
Debara Lyn Tucci is an American otolaryngologist,studying ear,nose,and throat conditions. She co-founded the Duke Hearing Center and currently serves as a professor of Surgery and Director of the Cochlear Implant Program at Duke University. In September 2019 she became Director of the National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders,one of the National Institutes of Health's 27 Institutes and Centers.
Elena Margaret Plante is a researcher and speech-language pathologist specializing in developmental language disorders in children and adults. She holds the position of Professor and previously was Head of the Department of Speech,Language,and Hearing Sciences (SLHS) at the University of Arizona (UA). She is the principal investigator at the eponymous Plante Laboratory at UA. Plante is also affiliated with the Cognitive Science program at UA.
Nancy Helm-Estabrooks is an emeritus professor at Western Carolina University where she was the first Brewer Smith Distinguished Professor. She is known for her work on persons with aphasia and acquired cognitive-communication disorders.
