VERBAL MEMORY FUNCTION IN MILD APHASIA

Verbal material may be processed by semantic and phonologic systems. D amage to these language systems may also impair memory. We classified 16 mildly aphasic patients according to phonologic and lexicosemantic abilities, tested them on a variety of short- and long-term memory mea sures, and correlated behavioral deficits with lesion location, Aphasi a impaired both short- and long-term memory. Phonologic impairment aff ected only digit span performance. Lexicosemantic deficits impaired se lf-organized encoding of word lists. Memory impairment was not associa ted with specific lesion locations, Persistent verbal-memory impairmen ts accompanying even mild residual aphasia may be responsible for much of the difficulty mildly aphasic patients experience returning to voc ational, academic, and social life. Go-occurrence of these deficits pr obably reflects their underlying dependence on similar processing syst ems.