Neuro Cog Com Exam 1

Selection Attention

Can you attend to one aspect of a situation or stimulus and ignore others

Capacity Limitation

Only so much information can be consciously attended to, or held and manipulated in memory; closely related to concept of working memory

Working Memory

limited capacity for maintaining and actively manipulating information

External Distraction

perceptual stimuli

Internal Distraction

thoughts, feelings, internal situations

Sensory Memory

Traces of sensory input that persist on briefly; allows us to select what to pay attention to next

short term memory

maintaining information for seconds or minutes; essentially “holding” part of the “hold and manipulation info” definition of working memory

Working Memory

capacity for maintaining and actively manipulating information

Long Term Memory

Maintaining information over days to year

Declarative Memory

knowledge you can consciously access

nondeclarative

knowledge you can’t consciously access

Episodic memory (declarative)

contextual information (birthday party, time you fell of a bike)

semantic memory (declarative)

world knowledge; memory for facts (name of the president, properties of objects, etc.)

Procedural Memory (non-declarative)

learning motor or automatized cognitive skills (riding a bike, reading)

Classical Conditioning (non-declarative)

pairing of potent with otherwise neutral stimulus

Prospective Memory

Remembering to remember (to-do lists, smartphone calendars with alarms, checklists)

Assessing EF in the clinic

use tasks w/ more functional/real world relevance; combine norm-referenced measures with qualitative observation (BADS, FAVRES, CLQT)

Aphasia

language disorder caused by acquired brain injury, usually to the left hemisphere; negatively affects long-term quality of life, leads to social isolation and is associated with increased depression and anxiety

Aphasia can affect…

talking (expressive aphasia); listening comprehension (receptive aphasia); writing (agraphia); reading (alexia)

common causes of Aphasia (acquired)

stroke; trauma; tumor; infection

common causes of Aphasia (nerudegenerative)

primary progressive aphasia

Common language deficits of aphasia

anomia; auditory comprehension deficits; agrammatism/paragrammatism; dysgraphia/dyslexia

Common associated performance characteristic of aphasia

slowed processing times; reliance on situational context to understand/convey meaning; reduced sentence length/complexity; perseverative speech; reduced verbal STM and WM span; reduced gestures and co-verbal behaviors

Wernicke’s Aphasia

Fluent; poor auditory comprehension, poor repetition

Broca’s Aphasia

nonfluent; good auditory comprehension; poor repetition

Global Aphasia

Nonfluent; poor auditory comprehension; poor repetition

Anomic Aphasia

Fluent; good repetition; good auditory comprehension

conduction aphasia

Fluent; good auditory comprehension; poor repetition

Transcortical Motor Aphasia

Nonfluent; good auditory comprehension; good repetition

How do SLPs help people with Aphasia?

Restorative impairment-focused treatment; compensatory treatment; counseling; education

Major areas of communication impairment in RHD

Lexical-semantics; prosody; discourse; pragmatics

Transcortical Sensory Aphasia

fluent; poor auditory comprehension; good repetition

Goal of Aphasia comprehensive assessment

characterize function of language system, relative strengths and weaknessess

components to Aphasia assessment

Comprehensive lang assessment; functional communication assessment; motor speech screening/assessment; cognitive screening; evaluation of psychosocial consequences of aphasia

Comprehensive Lang Assessment Tasks

comprehensive aphasia test (CAT); performance; supplemental assessment as indicated

motor speech screening

oral mech; AMRs/SMRs; 5 subsystems of speech production; comprehensibility

cognitive screening tasks

ravens (non-linguistic)

Psychosocial consequences assessment tasks

ACOM; BOSS; interview; mental health screening

Tests of specific language function

detailed follow up testing to characterize more specific nature of linguistic breakdowns, inform treatment selection

Functional Langauge Assessment Tasks

CADL-2; ASHA FACS; scenario test; natural or structured observation

person level and psychosocial consequences assessment tasks

how does pt feel about their aphasia and the impact on their life; ACOM; BOSS; mental health screening

Goal setting - FOURC

choose communication goal, create client solutions, collaborate a plan, complete and continue

guidelines on writing aphasia assessment

report and comment on formal/informal assessment; impressions section; recommendations and treatment plan

main approaches for aphasia assessment

comprehensive formal lang assessment; patient/family interview; natural observation; formal/informal screening approaches

types of aphasia treatment approaches

restorative impairment-focused treatment; compensatory treatment; counseling and other emotional support; education

impairment-focused language tx tasks

EPB; naming/production; reading & writing; auditory comprehension; functional communication during conversations

Active Ingredients

what the therapist does or provides

mechanism of action

why the treatment is expected to work (theoretical rationale)

Tx Target

aspect of functioning directly targeted (think STG)

Tx Aim

overarching goal of therapy (think LTG); often multiple targets used together to treat a single aim

compensatory treatment tasks

good instructional techniques and understanding of cognitive considerations essential to successful training and use of compensatory strategies (partner-supported communication, circumlocution and self-cueing strategies, AAC, smartphones and tablets)

counseling tasks

very high incidence of anxiety, depression, social isolation and reduced quality of life; help PWA and caregivers cope with grief and loss, address barriers to successful communication, connect PWA to local and national support resources