Coping Resources, Perceived Stress, and Life Experiences in Individuals with Aphasia

Individuals with certain forms of aphasia may be under considerable stress related to their linguistic skills. The current study explored coping resources, perceived stress, and life experiences in individuals with aphasia. The relation of these factors to salivary cortisol, a physiologic index of stress, was additionally investigated. Results indicate individuals with aphasia have fewer coping resources and greater perceived stress than healthy controls. Salivary cortisol was not related to perceived stress or coping resources, but was related to life experiences during the previous six months. Clinical and theoretical implications are discussed

Perceived stress and depression in stroke patients with and without aphasia

Therefore, the purpose of the current study is to determine whether perceived stress, neurological functioning, and depressive symptoms are associated in a sample of left hemisphere stroke patients with aphasia (LH) and right hemisphere stroke patients without aphasia (RH). We also explore change over time in these measures

Digit Span in Individuals with Aphasia and Right Hemisphere Damage

Although there is evidence that individuals with aphasia (IWA) have a reduced working memory capacity, there is disagreement amongst researchers as to the most appropriate measure of working memory in this population. This study explores performance on forward and backward digit span tasks in IWA and individuals with right brain damage (RBD). Findings indicate IWA perform worse on forward digit span than do RBD, however, there is no difference in performance between the two groups on the backward digit span task. Clinical and theoretical implications are discussed

Coping Resources in Individuals with Aphasia

Laures-Gore, Hammilton, and Matheny (2007) found that individuals with aphasia (IWA) have greater perceived stress and fewer perceived coping resources to deal with stressors than healthy controls. The present study further explores this finding by examining which coping resources are most affected in IWA. The perceived coping resources of confidence, social support, financial freedom, stress monitoring, tension control, and acceptance in IWA were compared to right brain damage and healthy individuals. IWA differed from these groups in the areas of perceived confidence, stress monitoring, tension control, and acceptance. Clinical implications are discussed

Cortisol over time in stroke patients and its relation with language change

The current study explored the interplay between stroke, language, and the stress biomarker, cortisol, in individuals with aphasia (IWA) and individuals with right brain damage (RBD). Nineteen IWA following a left-hemisphere stroke and 12 RBD participants began the study between one to six months post-stroke and were followed for three months. Language skills were assessed monthly; afternoon salivary cortisol samples were collected biweekly. Individuals with aphasia showed improvements in language test scores, however, language was not associated with afternoon salivary cortisol levels.  The RBD group demonstrated fairly unchanging test scores, but naming ability did relate to salivary cortisol levels

The influence of speaker and listener variables on intelligibility of dysarthric speech

This study compared changes in speech clarity as a function of speaking context. It is well documented that words produced in sentence contexts yield higher intelligibility than words in isolation for speakers with mild to moderate dysarthria. To tease apart the effect of speaker and listener variables, the current study aimed to quantify differences in word intelligibility by speaking task. Eighteen speakers with dysarthria produced a set of 25 words in isolation and within the context of a sentence. Eighteen listeners heard a randomized sample of the isolated productions, single words extracted from the sentences, and the full unaltered sentences. Listeners transcribed what they heard and rated their confidence. Words produced in isolation were just as intelligible as words produced in sentence context, both of which were more intelligible than extracted words. In other words, speakers reduced articulatory clarity in sentence production compared to isolated productions; listeners were able to cope with this reduction in clarity when they had access to contextual information but not when these cues were removed in the extracted condition. These findings are consistent with Lindblom's hypo–hyperarticulation theory in that adults with dysarthria appear to be modulating articulatory precision based on listener/task variables. This work has implications for clinical practice in that isolated word and sentence production tasks yielded equivalent intelligibility findings