A cognitive and psycholinguistic investigation of neologisms

Abstract

Background: Jargon aphasia with neologisms (i.e., novel nonword utterances) is a challenging language disorder that lacks a definitive theoretical description as well as clear treatment recommendations (Marshall, 2006). We would like to express our deepest gratitude to FF and his wife for their interest and enthusiasm and their many hours of participation for this research. We also thank Dr Myrna Schwartz and Paula Sobel for sharing the digital pictures of the Philadelphia Naming Test, and we appreciate the help from Gillian Macdonald, Jenna Pawlow, and Kingsley Yang for their assistance in experimental development. This research was supported by the Toronto Rehabilitation Institute and Ontario Ministry of Health Post Doctoral Fellowship (AB), the Canada Research Chair Program, and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada MCRI program (LB). Aim: The aims of this two‐part investigation were to determine the source of neologisms in an individual (FF) with jargon aphasia, to identify potential facilitatory semantic and/or phonological cueing effects in picture naming, and to determine whether the timing of the cues relative to the target picture mediated the cueing advantage. Methods and Procedures: FF's underlying linguistic deficits were determined using several cognitive and linguistic tests. A series of computerised naming experiments using a modified version of the 175‐item Philadelphia Naming Test (Roach, Schwartz, Martin, Grewal, & Brecher, 1996) manipulated the cue type (semantic versus phonological) and relatedness (related versus unrelated). In a follow‐up experiment, the relative timing of phonological cues was manipulated to test the effect of timing on the cueing advantage. The accuracy of naming responses and error patterns were analysed. Outcome and Results: FF's performance on the linguistic and cognitive test battery revealed a severe naming impairment with relatively spared word and nonword repetition, auditory comprehension of words and monitoring, and fairly well‐preserved semantic abilities. This performance profile was used to evaluate various explanations for neologisms including a loss of phonological codes, monitoring failure, and impairments in semantic system. The primary locus of his deficit appears to involve the connection between semantics to phonology, specifically, when word production involves accessing the phonological forms following semantic access. FF showed a significant cueing advantage only for phonological cues in picture naming, particularly when the cue preceded or coincided with the onset of the target picture. Conclusions: When integrated with previous findings, the results from this study suggest that the core deficit of this and at least some other individuals with jargon aphasia is in the connection from semantics to phonology. The facilitative advantage of phonological cues could potentially be exploited in future clinical and research studies to test the effectiveness of these cues for enhancing naming performance in individuals like FF.