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Reading lexically without semantics: Evidence from patients with probable Alzheimer's disease

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 February 2009

Anastasia M. Raymer  and
Rita Sloan Berndt
Anastasia M. Raymer
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, University of Maryland Medical School, Baltimore, Maryland
Rita Sloan Berndt
Affiliation:
Department of Neurology, University of Maryland Medical School, Baltimore, Maryland
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Abstract

Recent modifications of the lexical model of oral reading make the prediction that under conditions where sublexical reading processes alone cannot achieve the target pronunciation (i.e., when words have exceptional spellings or when sublexical processes are impaired), patients with severe semantic impairment should have more difficulty reading aloud semantically impaired words than semantically retained words. In a battery of lexical-semantic and reading tasks, two neurologically normal control subjects and two subjects with probable Alzheimer's disease (AD) and only moderate semantic impairment read aloud all words accurately. One AD subject with severe semantic impairment was impaired in word reading but demonstrated no difference in reading words with regular and exceptional spellings. Another AD subject with severe semantic impairment read aloud without error virtually all regular and exception words. Neither severely impaired AD subject demonstrated any relationship between oral reading accuracy and semantic knowledge of exception words. These findings support a model of word reading incorporating lexical, nonsemantic processes by which lexical orthographic input representations directly activate lexical phonological output representations without the necessity of semantic mediation. (JINS, 1996, 2, 340–349.)

Keywords

Oral readingAcquired dyslexiaDementia
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society , Volume 2 , Issue 4 , July 1996 , pp. 340 - 349
Copyright
Copyright © The International Neuropsychological Society 1996

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