PANTOMIME RECOGNITION IMPAIRMENT IN APHASIA - AN ANALYSIS OF ERROR TYPES

Aphasic patients were administered a pantomine recognition test (PRT) and two verbal comprehension tests with the same perceptual-motor, sem antic, and neutral response foils in a test of the hypothesis that bot h pantomime and verbal comprehension impairments reflect the same unde rlying aphasic disorder. Perceptual-motor errors were significantly mo re common than semantic and neutral errors on the PRT, whereas semanti c errors were significantly more common on the combined verbal tests. The results support the view that errors in pantomime recognition amon g aphasic patients may occur as a function of a deficit in perceptual- motor ability in addition to semantic impairment. Pantomime recognitio n performance did not correlate significantly with measures of languag e or praXiS. (C) 1994 Academic Press, Inc.