Modified semantic feature analysis for anomia: a case study in Chinese
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1
Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, SAR China
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2
Independent researcher, Hong Kong, SAR China
Background. Semantic feature analysis (SFA) (Boyle & Coelho, 1995; Law, et al., 2006) has been reported as an effective treatment to promote lexical retrieval by improving the semantic network. The application of SFA requires patients to identify semantic features based on a structured framework provided during treatment. However, a structured framework may limit the number of semantic features elicited. In addition, the semantic features elicited from the structured framework may not have high specificity for certain lexical items and activating them may not lead to effective retrieval of the specific targets. In this study, we modified SFA by using an odd man out task designed to encourage the patient to generate as many distinctive semantic features for the target items as possible, in response to the requirements of comparing and contrasting features of object names belonging to the same categories. Using this design, all semantic features were self-generated by the patient and a greater variety of semantic features was elicited. Furthermore, all the features identified were “distinctive” among the stimuli sharing the same category, given the requirements of the odd-man-out task. It was expected that the modified SFA training task would result in generalization to a greater variety of untrained lexical items.
Method. FKH, a 21-year-old right-handed male speaker of Cantonese who underwent a surgical treatment for arteriovenous malformations 16 months before the study was invited to participate in this treatment study. He was a third-year university undergraduate student when he was first assessed in the current study. No visual, hearing, or motor impairment was reported. Results of initial assessment showed a preserved semantic system, preserved performance in reading aloud but impaired performance in picture naming, indicating a possible access problem to the phonological output lexicon.
A total of 12 treatment sessions were conducted. FKH’s pre- and post-treatment accuracies of oral and written naming of 217 selected pictures in Snodgrass and Vanderwart (1980) were obtained. His abilities to name the semantic features of treatment targets and untreated targets across sessions were also obtained. Digit span task was used as control.
Results. The results showed a significant increase in the number of semantic features retrieved within treatment sessions (p < .05). Moreover, the results of McNemar’s test showed significant improvement in oral picture naming [X2(1) = 10.37, p < .05] but not in written picture naming (p > .05).
Discussion. The unchanged digit span performance in the pre- and post-treatment measures supported that the improvements in oral naming accuracy should be attributed to the treatment given instead of any spontaneous recovery that might have occurred. Although the written naming improvement is not significant, the significant (p < .05) reduction of semantic errors and increase in “no response” errors in the post-treatment assessment probably indicated that he had sufficient semantic information to reject other semantically related lexical items, but the semantic information was still not sufficient to retrieve the target lexical items. Theoretical and clinical implications will be discussed.
Acknowledgements
We are grateful to FKH for his participation in the study.
References
Coelho, C. A., McHugh, R. E., & Boyle, M. (2000). Semantic feature analysis as a treatment for aphasic dysnomia: A replication. Aphasiology, 14, 133–142.
Law, S. P., Wong, W., Sung, F., & Hon, J. (2006). A study of semantic treatment of three Chinese anomic patients. Neuropsychological Rehabilitation, 16(6), 601–629.
Snodgrass, J. G., & Vanderwart, M. (1980). A standarised set of 260 pictures: Norms for name agreement, image agreement, familiarity and visual complexity. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 6, 174–215.
Tam, M.H.C., & Lau, D.K.Y. (2019). Modified semantic feature analysis for anomia: a single case study. Clinical Linguistics and Phonetics. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699206.2019.1594382
Keywords:
Anomia,
Aphasia (language),
Chinese (Cantonese),
Treatment,
semantic feature analysis (SFA)
Conference:
Academy of Aphasia 57th Annual Meeting, Macau, Macao, SAR China, 27 Oct - 29 Oct, 2019.
Presentation Type:
Poster presentation
Topic:
Not eligible for student award
Citation:
Yeung
H,
Tam
H and
Lau
K
(2019). Modified semantic feature analysis for anomia: a case study in Chinese.
Front. Hum. Neurosci.
Conference Abstract:
Academy of Aphasia 57th Annual Meeting.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fnhum.2019.01.00029
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Received:
30 Apr 2019;
Published Online:
09 Oct 2019.
*
Correspondence:
Dr. Kai-Yan Dustin Lau, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Kowloon, Hong Kong, SAR China, dustin.lau@polyu.edu.hk