Aphasia

Aphasia is an acquired impairment of language production or comprehension caused by damage to brain regions involved in language. It can affect speaking, understanding, reading, and writing.

Language processing: The mental operations that support understanding and producing language. Aphasia disrupts one or more operations involved in understanding or producing language.
Broca's area: A region in the left frontal lobe associated with speech production and language processing. Damage here can contribute to effortful, nonfluent speech.
Broca's aphasia: A nonfluent aphasia marked by effortful speech, often with relatively better comprehension. It exemplifies how speech production can be more impaired than comprehension.
Aphasia diagnosis: The clinical identification and characterization of acquired language impairment. Assessment distinguishes affected language abilities and helps guide care.
Dysarthria: A motor speech disorder caused by impaired control of the muscles used for speaking. Dysarthria affects speech execution, whereas aphasia affects language.
Phonology: The sound system of a language and the patterns governing how its sounds combine. Damage can impair the selection and sequencing of speech sounds.
Wernicke's area: A region in the left posterior temporal lobe associated with language comprehension. Damage here can produce fluent speech with impaired comprehension.
Wernicke's aphasia: A fluent aphasia marked by impaired comprehension and often reduced meaningful content. It contrasts fluent output with substantial difficulty understanding language.
Speech-language pathology: A clinical profession that assesses and treats communication and swallowing disorders. Speech-language pathologists assess aphasia and provide individualized rehabilitation.
Apraxia of speech: A motor planning disorder that impairs the coordination of speech movements. It can make speech effortful without being a language impairment itself.

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