Classification of Aphasia

Nonfluent Fluent Speech production is halting and effortful. Person is able to produce connected speech. Grammar is impaired; content words may be preserved. Sentence structure is relatively intact but lacks meaning.

Language comprehension Language comprehension Language comprehension Language comprehension relatively intact impaired relatively intact impaired

Broca’s Aphasia: repetition of Conduction Aphasia: word Wernicke’s Aphasia: Global Aphasia: severe words/phrases poor finding difficulties; difficulty repetition of words/phrases expressive and receptive repeating phrases poor Transcortical Motor Aphasia: language impairment; may be strong repetition skills; may able to communicate using Anomic Aphasia: repetition Transcortical Sensory have difficulty spontaneously facial expression, intonation, of words/phrases good; word Aphasia: repetition of answering questions and gestures finding difficulties; uses words/phrases good; may generic fillers (e.g., “thing”) or repeat questions rather than circumlocution answering them (“echolalia”)

This figure describes various aphasia types, using a classification system based on characteristics of verbal expression (nonfluent or fluent; Davis, 2007; Goodglass & Kaplan, 1972). Crossed aphasia and subcortical aphasia are considered “exceptional aphasias,” as they do not fit neatly within this or other common classification systems. Crossed aphasia occurs when a person demonstrates language impairment after suffering damage to the hemisphere on the dominant side of the body, rather than the alternate side. Thus, a right handed person who develops aphasia following a right hemisphere stroke exhibits crossed aphasia. Subcortical aphasia results from damage to subcortical regions of the brain (e.g., thalamus or basal ganglia), and symptoms can mirror those that arise from cortical lesions. Primary progressive aphasia (PPA)—despite its name—is a type of dementia. It is characterized by gradual loss of language function in the context of relatively well-preserved memory, visual processing, and personality until the advanced stages (Mesulam, 2001; Rogers, 2004). For more information about PPA, see ASHA’s Practice Portal page on Dementia.

Davis, G. A. (2007). Aphasiology: Disorders and clinical practice (2nd ed.). Needham Heights, MA: Allyn & Bacon. Goodglass, H., & Kaplan, E. (1972). The assessment of aphasia and related disorders. Philadelphia, PA: Lea & Febiger. Mesulam, M. (2001). Primary progressive aphasia. Annals of Neurology, 49, 425-432. Rogers, M. (2004). Aphasia, primary progressive. In R. D. Kent (Ed.), The MIT encyclopedia of communication disorders (pp. 245-249). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.