Impaired repetition is most characteristic of which PPA variant, and impaired naming is most characteristic of which?

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Multiple Choice

Impaired repetition is most characteristic of which PPA variant, and impaired naming is most characteristic of which?

Repetition relies on phonological processing and the phonological loop in working memory. The logopenic variant of PPA shows prominent repetition impairment early on because this phonological storage/rehearsal system is disrupted, even when other language abilities like single-word comprehension and grammar are relatively preserved. Naming, on the other hand, depends on retrieving lexical-semantic knowledge. Semantic dementia (semantic variant) erodes semantic memory, leading to marked naming difficulties (anomia) as objects lose their meaning and labels become hard to access, which makes naming impairment most characteristic of this variant. Other variants don’t pair as cleanly with these deficits: nonfluent variant centers on effortful speech and agrammatism (speech production problems), not repetition per se, especially early on. So the combination of repetition impairment with logopenic variant and naming impairment with semantic dementia best fits the description.

Repetition relies on phonological processing and the phonological loop in working memory. The logopenic variant of PPA shows prominent repetition impairment early on because this phonological storage/rehearsal system is disrupted, even when other language abilities like single-word comprehension and grammar are relatively preserved. Naming, on the other hand, depends on retrieving lexical-semantic knowledge. Semantic dementia (semantic variant) erodes semantic memory, leading to marked naming difficulties (anomia) as objects lose their meaning and labels become hard to access, which makes naming impairment most characteristic of this variant.

Other variants don’t pair as cleanly with these deficits: nonfluent variant centers on effortful speech and agrammatism (speech production problems), not repetition per se, especially early on. So the combination of repetition impairment with logopenic variant and naming impairment with semantic dementia best fits the description.

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