Cognitive neuropsychology and conversation analysis in aphasia therapy

Cognitive neuropsychology has made it possible to analyze individuals' language disorders through a psycholinguistic model and to quantify and evaluate the effects of intervention.

The complementary methods of conversation analysis are also being introduced into assessment, with the potential for bringing a further structured approach to intervention.This book introduces readers to both these systems through the study of actual clients with whom the authors and their colleagues have worked.

It takes the form of a workbook, and readers are provided with information, stage by stage, and asked to form their own hypothesis before being given the author's own suggestions and results.

The six cases used illustrate different disorders of language processing.

The assessments are presented exactly as they occurred in clinical practice, and the authors use their deficiencies as a learning exercise to encourage readers to consider how they could have been improved, what further investigations are needed and what inferences for intervention can be drawn from them.

Details of all the assessment materials used are provided, together with a simple method of evaluating the effectiveness of the proposed therapy.The book should be of interest to speech and language therapists, clinical linguists, clinical psychologists and their students who wish to use these two systems in their work with aphasic clients.