Effects of Rate of Speech and Linguistic Stress on Auditory Paragraph Comprehension of Aphasic Individuals

Auditory comprehension performance of 20 aphasic and 8 nonaphasic subjects was analyzed in a paragraph comprehension task in which rate of speech and linguistic stress were systematically altered. Aphasic subjects were assigned to either high- or low-level auditory comprehension groups on the basis of their performance on a shortened form of the Token Test. Paragraphs were presented either with slow rate of speech (120 wpm) or normal rate of speech (150 wpm) with either normal or exaggerated stress given to critical elements within sentences in the paragraphs. Paragraph comprehension was measured by analyzing subjects' response accuracy on a series of yes/no questions which followed each paragraph. Scores of both aphasic subject groups were significantly higher for paragraphs presented with slow rate of speech than for those presented at normal rate and for paragraphs presented with exaggerated stress than for normal stress paragraphs. No significant interactions between rate and stress were observed. Rate and stress did not affect performance of nonaphasic subjects. A significant positive correlation between Token Test scores and paragraph scores was observed for high-level aphasic subjects; the correlation between these measures was low and nonsignificant for low-level aphasic subjects. Implications of these findings are discussed for diagnosis and treatment of auditory comprehension deficits in aphasic individuals.

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