Accessing semantic knowledge in dementia: evidence from a word definition task

被引:15
作者
Astell, AJ [1 ]
Harley, TA
机构
[1] Univ St Andrews, Sch Psychol, St Andrews KY16 9JU, Fife, Scotland
[2] Univ Dundee, Dept Psychol, Dundee DD1 4HN, Scotland
基金
英国医学研究理事会; 英国经济与社会研究理事会;
关键词
D O I
10.1016/S0093-934X(02)00021-4
中图分类号
R36 [病理学]; R76 [耳鼻咽喉科学];
学科分类号
100104 ; 100213 ;
摘要
We examine production of word definitions by people with probable Alzheimer's disease (pAD). In the first experiment, healthy young adults defined concrete, imageable nouns to provide a baseline of definitional ability. Analysis of these definitions identified the key defining features of each target item. In the second experiment, pAD participants and elderly controls produced definitions of the same items. In the third experiment, healthy young participants rated the adequacies of these definitions. Although as expected the pAD participants produced fewer good definitions than the other two groups, most of their responses still contained some relevant information. pAD definitions contained fewer pieces of information and the information they produced was more tangential to the primary concept than that provided by the young or elderly participants. We identify two possible explanations in semantic loss and metalinguistic impairment. We consider metalinguistic impairment to provide the more plausible explanation of pAD patients' definitional performance. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved.
引用
收藏
页码:312 / 326
页数:15
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