The relationship between type of naming error and semantic-lexical discrimination in aphasic patients

When submitted to confrontation naming tasks, aphasic patients show different types of naming errors: phonetic, phonemic and verbal-semantic paraphasias, neologisms and anomia, but it is generally difficult to decide whether these errors are mainly due to a breakdown of the semantic systems or to post-lexical phonological disorders. In order to clarify this issue, 118 aphasic patients were given 3 tests of confrontation naming and 3 tests of semantic-lexical discrimination. Naming errors on confrontation were used to classify aphasic patients in various subgroups (according to the prevalence of a given type of naming error), whereas performances obtained on tests of semantic-lexical discrimination were taken as an index of disorganization of the semantic systems. The performances on semantic discrimination tests of patients showing a prevalence of phonetic, phonemic and verbal-semantic paraphasias, neologisms and anomia on confrontation naming tasks were compared. A very small number of semantic discrimination errors was obtained by patients showing a prevalence of phonetic or phonemic transformations on confrontation, whereas a much larger number of semantic discrimination errors was obtained by patients showing a prevalence of verbal-semantic paraphasias, neologisms and anomia.