Exploring Syntactic Processing Deficits in Broca's Aphasia through Priming Paradigms
1Girija P.C, 2Nayana Narayanan, 3Anjana K, 4Girija P.CThis research explores syntactic processing through priming in individuals diagnosed with Broca’s aphasia, a condition marked by compromised syntactic capabilities resulting from damage to the left frontal lobe. Utilizing Paradigm software, the investigation assesses the relative ease and difficulty of recognizing various syntactic categories, including plurals, tenses, verbs, person-number-gender (PNG) markers, and conjunctions, among 30 Malayalam-speaking participants with Broca’s aphasia. The analysis of reaction times for syntactic identification tasks indicated that plurals were the most easily identified category, whereas conjunctions presented the greatest difficulty. Statistical evaluation via the Friedman test revealed no significant differences in reaction times among the categories, implying a generalized impairment in syntactic processing rather than specific deficits related to individual categories. These results are consistent with existing research that emphasizes the increased processing demands associated with complex syntactic structures, such as conjunctions, compared to simpler forms like plurals. The study highlights the potential of syntactic priming as a therapeutic approach to improve sentence processing, offering encouraging prospects for language rehabilitation in individuals with Broca’s aphasia