An impairment in processing verbs' thematic roles: A therapy study

Abstract

This paper describes a subject with a selective verb disorder. Verb retrieval was impaired both in spontaneous speech and naming. When verbs were accessed a striking dissociation emerged. Subcategorization was surprisingly intact, while the assignment of verbs' thematic roles was poor. Verb comprehension was also impaired, particularly when tasks demanded an appreciation of thematic information. A remediation programme was administered which aimed to improve insight into the role structures and mapping requirements of three argument verbs. Evaluation showed gains in the production of this type of verb, which generalized to untreated items. However, there was no generalization to verbs of a different type. Progress was also suggested by a second evaluative procedure, in which observers were asked to judge the intelligibility of the subject's output, before and after therapy. The theoretical implications of the findings are discussed.