Assessment of pragmatic competence in neurodegenerative diseases: theoretical and methodological challenges
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https://doi.org/10.25267/Pragmalinguistica.2023.i31.09Info
Authors
- Olga Ivanova (ES) Universidad de Salamanca https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9657-5380
- Emma Machado de Souza (ES) University of Salamanca https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4443-9739
- Soraya Méndez Sanz (ES) Pontifical University of Salamanca / University of Salamanca https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3804-6587
- Esther Ochoa Obeso (ES) University of Salamanca https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9205-2902
Abstract
Impaired pragmatic competence is part of the primary symptomatology of many clinical conditions linked to neurodevelopment (e.g. autism spectrum disorder), acquired disorders (e.g. right hemisphere lesions) or neurodegenerative diseases (e.g. frontotemporal dementia). It is also not uncommon to record its secondary impairment, derived from alterations of other linguistic levels, such as the lexical-semantic level (e.g. Alzheimer’s disease). The study of such impairment faces, however, a number of challenges on both theoretical level (what is meant by units of pragmatic analysis) and methodological level (how to study such units and assess their degree of impairment). The aim of this paper is to offer a critical perspective on the main challenges in the study of pragmatic competence in neurodegenerative diseases, specifically in Alzheimer’s disease, focusing on the following three: the variability of theoretical approaches, the variability of methodological approaches, and the masking role of compensatory strategies.
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Copyright (c) 2023 Olga Ivanova, Emma Machado de Souza, Soraya Méndez Sanz, Esther Ochoa Obeso
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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