BRAIN

AND

LANGUAGE

19, l-24 (1983)

Fundamental Frequency, Language Processing, and

Linguistic Structure in Wernickes Aphasia
MARTHA DANLY AND WILLIAM

E. COOPER

AND
BARBARA SHAPIRO

Five Wernickes aphasics and five normal control subjects were tested in order
to assess several aspects of fundamental frequency (F,,) in speech production.
The clinical impression of normal prosody in Wernickes aphasia is correct
inasmuch as these patients generally exhibited F,, declination. However, F,, declination ranged over shorter domains than in normal speech. Moreover. the
increased use of F,) continuation rises by the Wernickes aphasics indicated their
inability to maintain a single F,) contour over constituents which are normally
integral. The hypermelodic quality of F,, in the speech of Wernickes aphasics
further supported the notion that speech prosody was not strictly normal. F,)
attributes tended to be normal when they corresponded to the global linguistic
variable of sentence length, while they were abnormal when they corresponded
to the processing of syntactic structure. No evidence was found that paraphasias
and neologisms directly affected the programming of F,). The results are discussed
in terms of speech processing abilities and limitations in Wernickej aphasia.

This research was supported by NIH Grants NS 06029, NS 11408, NS 13028, and NS
15059, and a Dissertation Research Award to the first author from the Department of
Psychology and Social Relations, Harvard University. The authors gratefully acknowledge
Suzanne Hamby for assistance in testing subjects: John M. Sorensen for consulting on
acoustical matters; Kenneth N. Stevens for making available the computer facilities of the
Speech Communication Group, Research Laboratory of Electronics, MIT; Kyle R. Cave
for advice on text editing; and Sheila E. Blumstein. Roger W. Brown, Jill G. de Villiers.
Susan F. Ehrlich, Charles M. Judd. Edgar B. Zurif, and two anonymous reviewers for
helpful comments on the manuscript. Please address reprint requests to: Martha Danly.
Psychology Service 116-B. Aphasia Research Center, Boston Veterans Administration
Medical Center. I50 South Huntington Avenue. Boston. MA 02130.
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DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

INTRODUCTION

In recent years, speech prosody has become an increasingly useful

medium for the study of language representation and processing in normal
speech production (for reviews, see Cooper & Paccia-Cooper, 1980;
Cooper & Sorensen, 1981). Speech prosody refers to variations in three
acoustic properties of the speech wave: duration, amplitude, and fundamental frequency (FO). The perceptual correlates of these attributes
include speech rate and timing, stress, and intonation (Lehiste, 1970;
Lieberman, 1967). Because elements of speech prosody systematically
correspond to features of linguistic structure, such as sentence length,
syntactic boundaries, and semantic reference, we can acquire knowledge
about the underlying structure and processing of language by measuring
such prosodic elements. In this paper we are primarily concerned with
the acoustical analysis of speech produced by patients with Wernickes
aphasia in order to provide a description of its F0 patterns. We will use
the F,, patterns to examine similarities and differences between aphasic
and normal speakers in terms of linguistic structure and sentence production
strategies.
Clinically, patients with Wernickes aphasia demonstrate several types
of language comprehension deficits, which fall into semantic, syntactic,
phonemic, and lexical domains (e.g., Rinnert & Whitaker, 1973; Parisi
& Pizzamiglio, 1970; Blumstein, 1973; Zurif & Caramazza, 1976; respectively). In contrast, the language production of Wernickes aphasics
has few overt signs of syntactic difficulty, but contains frequent errors
of word and phoneme selection, termed verbal and phonemic paraphasias,
respectively (Green, 1969; Buckingham & Kertesz, 1974). The resulting
paraphasic speech, when combined with neologisms, yields semantically
empty though fluent speech (Goodglass & Geschwind, 1976).
Speech prosody in Wernickes aphasia is considered to remain intact
(Hecaen & Albert, 1978). In fact, the intonational contour or melodic
line of speech is used as a factor in the assessmentof aphasia, as exemplified
by the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Examination (Goodglass & Kaplan,
1972). According to this view, Brocas and Wernickes aphasics are
contrasted not only in terms of verbal fluency but in their ability to
maintain an intonational contour throughout an entire sentence. Whereas
the contour is limited to short phrases or is absent altogether in Brocas
aphasia, Wernickes aphasics appear able to produce an intonational
contour that spans an entire sentence. We suggest that this claim needs
to be systematically evaluated by acoustically measuring F,,. In doing
so we circumvent some of the limitations and biases inherent in perceptual
judgments of this attribute. In a study of Brocas aphasics, Danly and
Shapiro (1982) showed that under limited syntactic domains, somethough certainly not all-attributes of F,, can remain intact despite the
clinical impression of dysprosody. Although the melodic line in Wernickes

WERNICKES

APHASIA

aphasia sounds quite normal to the clinician, it may contain certain

abnormalities.
In a preliminary study of the oral reading of five Wernickes aphasics,
Cooper, Danly, and Hamby (1979) did, in fact, find a number of systematic
impairments in FO. Both the normal and abnormal F,, attributes may be
used to demonstrate the role of sentential and syntactic factors in sentence
planning in Wernickes aphasia. The purpose of the present study, then,
is to investigate these findings further and to examine their implications
for psycholinguistic models of sentence processing. We also discuss the
relationships among FO, speech timing, and paraphasia in order to investigate
the interaction of speech prosody and lexical selection. Below we define
the F,, attributes on which this study is focused and outline the experimental
hypotheses corresponding to each.
F,, Declination

It is a well-established finding in the speech communication literature

that F,, values tend to decrease throughout the course of a declarative
sentence (Bolinger, 1964; Cohen & tHart, 1967; Maeda, 1976). This
phenomenon, known as FO declination, is depicted in Fig. 1.
While several descriptions of F, declination have been proposed (e.g.,
OShaughnessy, 1976; Pierrehumbert, 1979), the Topline Rule as developed
by Sorensen and Cooper (1980) is particularly useful for our purposes
here, because it can be used to reflect the sensitivity of F, to syntactic
boundaries. The Topline Rule predicts peak F, values, which appear as
local F,, maxima on the stressed syllables of content words for normal,
nonemphatic speech (shown as PI-4 in Fig. 1).
The presence of F,, declination in Wernickes aphasia would allow us
to assess the following: (1) the speakers ability to plan and execute F.

TIME

(secl

FIG. I. Fundamental frequency contour and Topline Rule predictions for the four-peak
sentence, The book on the table wa.7 a gift ,frorn my mother. (P 1 = book; P2 = table:
P3 = gift; P4 = mother.) The Topline Rule is not used to predict the first peak of the
contour, because PI consistently occurs above the declination line (Olive. 1975: Maeda.
1976: Cooper & Sorensen. 1981).

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

patterns over relevant linguistic domains, and (2) the speakers ability
to control F0 despite paraphasias and neologisms.
F,, Resetting
In normal speech, a single declination line typically spans an entire
single-clause sentence. Within a given sentence with an established declination function, we define F, resetting as occurring at an observed F.
peak which is higher than the peak preceding it. For resetting to occur,
F, declination must be present both before and after resetting; in this
way, we exclude local perturbations in declination such as stress heightening. Resetting of the declination function normally occurs between
sentences or at clause boundaries of a multiclause sentence. As can be
seen in Fig. 2, F. resetting occurs on the word asleep, following the
relative clause. Note that the observed value of P3 is greater than the
value predicted on the basis of a single-function Topline Rule (solid line),
indicating F, resetting. For this sentence, it can be seen that F, values
are better predicted by two declination functions (broken lines) rather
than one.
Once established, F. declination can be used as a means to determine
the scope of linguistic planning in the following way. Since the F. declination
function requires some preplanning in order for the speaker to initiate
the sentence with an appropriate F. value, we may infer the organization
of linguistic units that coincide with the F, contour. For utterances in
which an intonation contour extends over the entire sentence, the preprogramming of the initial F,, value and declination indicates that, at least
160 -

70

I
1.0

I
30

I
2.0
TIME

I
4.0

I
5.0

(set)

FIG. 2. Fundamental frequency contour for the sentence, The car that Sally owned
was asleep on the large branch in the bee. (Pl = cat; P2 = owned; P3 = asleep; P4 =
branch; PS = tree.) The solid line represents the Topline Rule predictions for a single F,
declination function. Observe that P3 occurs above its predicted value, indicating F(, resetting.
The broken lines represent the Topline Rule predictions for two declination functions.
Note also the continuation
rise on the word owned at the end of the relative clause.

WERNICKES

APHASIA

at some level, the sentence has been planned in an integral manner. In

contrast, if F0 resetting occurs within a sentence, we cannot necessarily
claim that the entire sentence has been preplanned; rather, the syntactic
phrases or clauses that the POcontours span are more likely to be the
basic planning units. We hypothesize that the linguistic impairments in
Wernickes aphasia may be reflected in the occurrence of F,, resetting
in sentences that normally do not require resetting.
We might also expect F, resetting in Wernickes aphasia to differ from
normal patterns in two other respects. In normal speech, one determinant
of F,, resetting is the strength of syntactic boundaries, as defined by the
number of phrase structure nodes intervening between two words in a
surface structure tree diagram (OShaughnessy, 1979; Cooper & Sorensen,
1981). Given the syntactic comprehension deficits in Wernickes aphasia,
a faulty syntactic component may be reflected as a failure in speech
production to distinguish between boundaries differing in strength. For
example, in normal speech we typically find more F,, resetting after a
sentence-internal relative clause than after a prepositional phrase. This
distinction may be lost in Wernickes aphasia, as is the case in Brocas
aphasia (Danly & Shapiro, 1982). Moreover, there are certain syntactic
configurations at which resetting rarely occurs in normal speech, such
as minor boundaries within clauses. We might expect to find inappropriate
or indiscriminate use of resetting by Wernickes aphasics in such locations,
again demonstrating an underlying deficit in syntactic structure and
processing.
Continuution Rises
Often accompanying F, resetting, the continuation rise is a second
prosodic phenomenon sensitive to the variables of sentence length and
syntactic boundary strength. Occurring on the last syllable preceding a
syntactic boundary, a continuation rise is a 5 to 10 Hz increase in F,,
(Cooper & Sorensen, 1977; OShaughnessy, 1976, 1979). In Fig. 2, the
final rise on the word owned is a typical continuation rise, both in its
location and size. By measuring the frequency, location, and magnitude
of continuation rises in normal and Wernickes subjects, we will determine
the influence of sentence length and syntactic boundaries on their use.
The logic used to interpret the findings for continuation rises is similar
to that used for PO resetting. Because they signal the end of major
constituents, continuation rises may reveal differences in syntactic organization between normal and aphasic speakers.
The PI Ejfect
Normal speakers take into account the general length of a sentence
when programming the value of the first POpeak (Pl), such that longer
sentences are produced with higher Pl values (McAllister, 1971; Sorensen

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

& Cooper, 1980). Because the final peak of sentences occurs at approximately the same value and the F,, declination slope remains fairly constant
in single-clause sentences, a higher Pl in long sentences allows the
speaker an adequate range for the declination of F0 values. The PI effect
is examined in this study to establish whether overall sentence length,
declination, and F0 programming are properly coordinated in the speech
of Wernickes aphasics.
Sentence-Final F. Fall
In declarative sentences, the largest F, fall on a given word occurs
on the sentence-final word (Lea, 1973; Maeda, 1976). Not only does this
F. fall indicate the end of the utterance, but the minor falls which precede
it reveal the speakers intention to continue the utterance. As a demonstration that Brocas aphasics plan speech in units larger than the
single word, Danly and Shapiro (1982) showed that Brocas aphasics
produce the largest F. fall in sentence-terminal position. A similar analysis
will be undertaken here in order to examine the scope of speech planning
in Wernickes aphasia.
F. Variability and Speech Rate
To study further the degree to which Wernickes speech is prosodically
normal, we will determine whether normal subjects and Wemickes aphasics
exhibit similar valley-peak-valley
change in F,, (F,, variability). These
measurements are taken by summing the F,, change from each measured
words initial F. value (valley) to its greatest value (peak) to its final
value (valley); any additional variation due to a continuation rise is also
included. Acoustical analysis may reveal a difference between normal
and aphasic subjects that cannot be detected in subjective analysis.
As for speech rate, two recent studies have shown that speech fluency
(Kreindler, Mihailescu, & Fradis, 1980) and verbal rate (Deloche, JeanLouis, & Seron, 1979) call for more complex measures than simply the
number of words uttered per unit of time. They argue that in order to
characterize adequately the various forms of aphasia, a unidimensional
measure of speech rate is insufficient. Consideration of variables such
as overall speaking time, total number of words, number of silent pauses,
and mean duration of silent pauses is also required to provide a model
of speech rate that properly differentiates the types of aphasia. In the
present study we will relate the above observations to the relevant acoustic
data on speech timing in the reading of Wernickes aphasics. In addition,
we will comment on the relationship between speech timing and paraphasia.
As Butterworth (1979) has documented, paraphasias and neologisms are
more likely than real words to follow hesitation pauses in the spontaneous
speech of a jargon aphasic, indicating word-finding difficulty; we will
determine whether this finding extends to the present subject population
using a practiced reading paradigm.

WERNICKES

APHASIA

METHOD
Subjects
A total of IO subjects participated in this study. These included 5 right-handed male
Wernickes aphasics. ranging in age from 47 to 61. All subjects were tested at the Boston
Veterans Administration Hospital: they were the same subjects for which preliminary
results were reported in Cooper et al. (1979). Diagnoses were based on the Boston Diagnostic
Aphasia Examination (BDAE) (Goodglass & Kaplan, 1972). Each diagnosis was verified
by a CT scan which, for all 5 aphasics, showed a localized lesion in the left posterior
cerebral hemisphere due to an infarction of the brain tissue in the territory of the middle
cerebral artery. The degree of linguistic impairment in the aphasic subjects revealed a
range of severity from moderately to severely disordered. In oral reading, the least impaired
subject produced paraphasias and neologisms in 1% of the content words. while the most
impaired subject produced paraphasias and neologisms in about 90% of the content words.
Five normal male subjects were also tested. Matched in age, educational level. and
handedness to the experimental subjects, they were Boston-area residents who volunteered
to participate in a variety of psychology experiments. In addition, we tested five patients
with either anterior or posterior right-hemisphere damage. Our aim was to study neurological
control subjects whose brain damage was in the nondominant hemisphere. However, upon
analyzing the F,, patterns produced by the right-hemisphere patients, it was evident that
they exhibited certain gross abnormalities of prosody that would require explanations
distinct from those within the scope of this paper. Hence. the data gathered from these
subjects will receive separate treatment (Danly. Gardner. & Shapiro. 1982).

Sentence Materiuls
The sentences listed in Table I, taken from Cooper and Sorensen (lY81), were designed
to test the hypotheses outlined in the Introduction. The italicized key words were measured
to test F,) declination and F,, resetting. In sentences l-4 we measured three peaks, in
sentences 5-8 four peaks, and in sentences Y-12 five peaks. These sentences were designated
as short, medium. and long sentences, respectively. Notice that the three-peak and fivepeak sentences are paired to test the PI effect for short vs. long sentences. The order of
TABLE

I. The deer could be .ree,r from the car.

2. The /lost could have packed all the p/ares.
3. The car was asleep in the tree.

4. The fox has escaped from his cage.

5. The book on the table was a gift from my mother.
6. The lnan in the truck sent roses to his niec,e.

7. The students on the bus threw ~u,n at the teacher

8. The ducks in the park will eat popcorn

and peanuts

9. The deer by the canyon could be Seen from the ;c+doM, of the car
10. The host at the parry could have packed all the glusses with the plafes.

II. The cat that Sally ottaned was asleep on the large branch in the free.
12. The

fox that Sidney

cauxhr had escaped sometime last night from his cage.

DANLY,

COOPER, AND SHAPIRO

the sentences was randomized; the sentences were then presented to subjects with different
pseudorandom orders shown to alternate subjects. Two filler sentences appeared as the
first and last sentences of each list to eliminate the possibility of starting and finishing
effects. The sentences contained no punctuation other than sentence-final periods.

Procedure
The subjects were tested individually in a sound-insulated room. At the beginning of
each session, the experimenter told the subject that he would be given a list of sentences
to read first silently to himself and then aloud. After a practice oral reading of each sentence,
during which the experimenter monitored the recording levels and checked for emphatic
or contrastive stress, the subject read the sentence aloud for recording. On occasion,
particularly for the more disordered aphasics, the first recorded token included words that
were emphatically or contrastively stressed. If so, the experimenter asked the subject to
repeat the sentence, providing a verbal model of the sentence without such stress; the
subject was then asked to produce the sentence a second time for recording. The Wernickes
subjects appeared unable to avoid the use of stress in some sentence tokens despite their
ability to repeat single words in isolation without emphasis. In such cases we analyzed
the sentence token containing the least emphatic or contrastive stress.
Paraphasias and neologisms produced by the Wernickes subjects were not corrected
by the experimenter, as we were particularly interested in capturing F,) patterns in the
context of paraphasic and neologistic output. The subjects read each sentence aloud until
at least one clearly articulated version of the completed sentence was produced. All
utterances were recorded onto a Sony TC106A tape recorder via a Sony F-25 microphone.

Acoustical

Analysis

Employing a computerized procedure used in previous studies of normal speech, we

analyzed the utterances for FO, timing, and amplitude. The F0 values were determined
using Dr. W. L. Henkes FPRD program implemented on a PDP-9 computer at MITs
Research Laboratory of Electronics. The program digitized the amplitude-over-time speech
waveform and measured the durations of individual glottal cycles in voiced portions of
speech at a sampling rate of 10 kHz. The glottal-cycle durations were then inverted to
provide an estimate of F(,, which was plotted on a visual display accompanied by an
amplitude trace of the speech signal. (For a more detailed description of this procedure,
see Cooper & Sorensen, 1981.)
Measurements were recorded for the initial, peak, and final F,, and time of occurrence
for each key word. In addition to obtaining the above F,, measurements, we noted the use
of continuation rises and made a phonemic transcription of each utterance. Paraphasias
and neologisms did not hinder the experimenters ability to make the correct assignment
of the produced word to its target in the typed sentence. Even for the most paraphasic
subject, there was invariably a one-to-one correspondence between the number of words
in the produced and intended sentences. Moreover, the function words tended to remain
intact more often than the content words, thereby easing the task of mapping the output
utterance onto its target.

RESULTS

Summarized in Table 2 are the results of the F, measures for the

normal and Wernickes subjects. Below we report the findings with respect
to each of the measures.

WERNICKES

APHASIA

TABLE 2
SUMMARY

OF

F,, MEASURES

FOR NORMAL

F,) measure

SUBJECTS AND WERNICKES

Normal subjects
(N = 5)

APHASICS

Wernickes aphasics
(N = 5)

I. F,, declination

12.7 Hz/peak

2. F,, resetting
Short sentences
Medium sentences
Long sentences

0%
0%
60%

5%
55%
SO%

30%
90%

50%
50%

Prepositional phrase boundary

Relative clause boundary
Subject-predicate boundary
Other boundaries
3. Continuation rises
Short sentences
Medium sentences
Long sentences
Prepositional phrase boundary
Relative clause boundary
Subject-predicate boundary
Other boundaries
Magnitude
4. PI effect
Pl. short sentences
PI, long sentences
5. Sentence-final F,, fall (four-peak
sentences)
F,, fall, key word I
F,, fall, key word 2
F,) fall, key word 3
F,, fall, key word 4
6. F,, variability

N = 12
N=2

9.9 Hz/peak

N = 22
N = 18

0%
S%
50%

17%
45%
68%

30%
70%

80%
50%

N = II
N = 2
6.2 Hz

N = 26
N = 25
15.0 Hz

139.6 Hz
145.4 Hz

146.8 Hz
152.6 Hz

- 13.2 Hz
12.0 Hz
13.0 Hz
26.4 Hz

17.6 Hz
11.6 Hz
6.0 Hz
45.6 Hz

22.8 Hz

45.8 Hz

F, Declination

The first property of FO studied was declination, in part because it is

a primary feature of F, and also because it must be established prior to
the examination of F,, resetting.
To establish whether Wernickes aphasics produce F,, declination, we
initially intended to calculate the least-squares linear regressions of F,,
on time for the three-peak, four-peak, and five-peak sentences in order

10

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

to compare the slopes and goodness-of-fit measures with those for normal
subjects. But since the speech rate of normal subjects was almost twice
that of the aphasic subjects (the aphasics took an average of 6.54 set to
produce each sentence, while the normals took 3.35 set), we considered
a direct comparison of the declination slopes to be inappropriate. To
avoid the bias due to speech rate differences, we instead regressed F,
on the key words (peaks), thereby neutralizing the factor of time.
Generalizing across sentence length, we found that the Wernickes
aphasics produced a significant declination slope, of 9.9 Hz/peak: t(53)
= 8.87, p < .OOl, r = .77. For the normal subjects, the declination
slope was 12.7 Hz/peak (t(53) = 14.70, p < .OOl, Y = .90), which does
not differ significantly from the Wernickes declination slope (t( 115) =
1.38, p = .17, Y = .13). These results indicate that Wernickes aphasics
adequately program F. declination over sentence strings and that the
total decrease in F. is comparable to normal declination. This particular
finding coincides with the clinical impression that Wernickes aphasics
do not suffer from a disorder of speech prosody.
While the Wernickes aphasics, taken together, exhibited F. declination,
it is noteworthy that this effect is primarily attributable to four of the
five aphasic subjects (SM, WH, LMc, and ES), whose declination slopes
ranged from 10.2 to 17.0 Hz/peak. The fifth subject, RD, who was the
most severely aphasic of the group, produced virtually no declination
whatsoever, at 0.9 Hz/peak: t(9) = .78, p > .40, Y = .25. From this
observation we may conclude that F, declination is spared in Wernickes
aphasia, except perhaps in the severest of cases.
Having established F, declination in the aphasic subjects, we now turn
to the role of paraphasia in the programming of Fo. One might consider
that a disorder in the lexical selection process, exhibited as a paraphasia
or neologism, might disrupt the maintenance of F. declination. In keeping
with such a claim is the fact that RD, the most severely aphasic of the
group, produced virtually no declination and was almost entirely paraphasic
and neologistic (88% of the words). However, since practically all of
RDs content words were either paraphasic or neologistic, his speech
does not allow us to directly test the effect of paraphasia on declination;
likewise there is a similar lack of variability in subjects ES, WH, and
SM, whose paraphasias contributed to no more than 10% of their output.
Therefore, we focused on the speech of LMc, who produced verbal
paraphasias and neologisms in approximately half (54%) of the content
words. We considered two possible ways in which these errors might
affect declination: (1) the paraphasias and neologisms are consistently
accompanied by F, peaks that fall either above or below the declination
line (but not both), or (2) F. peaks of errors generally miss the declination
function more than the peaks of correct words. For this analysis, we
combined verbal paraphasias with neologisms into a single category of

WERNICKES

APHASIA

II

lexical selection errors, which we will call paraphasia in this analysis for
the sake of brevity.
To test these hypotheses we performed two sets of multiple regressions.
For the first, we regressed the F0 of each key word produced by LMc
on peak number, sentence length, and paraphasia. The results showed
that, when the other two independent variables are controlled for, paraphasias had no consistent additive or subtractive effect on F, (b = -7.9
Hz, t(44) = - 1.63, p > .lO). The second analysis was implemented in
two steps. We first regressed the F, of each key word on peak number
and sentence length. The resultant residuals were squared to eliminate
the negative values and then regressed on paraphasia. If the second
hypothesis were true, we would expect to find the large residuals paired
with the paraphasic words. Yet this second analysis revealed that the
paraphasias were no more inaccurately programmed for F,, than correct
words (t(46) = 1.23, p > .20, r = . IS). This last result suggests that,
at least in terms of F,, declination programming, errors in lexical selection
do not adversely affect intonation.
The Topline Rule as a predictor of F, is useful at this point in the
analysis. Having demonstrated F, declination and its lack of interaction
with paraphasia, we now turn to a more subtle comparison of F,, patterns
in normal and Wernickes subjects. As mentioned in the Introduction,
the Topline Rule mathematically describes the relation between F0 and
time and is used to predict F, peak values between the initial and final
peaks of a given sentence. One use of the Topline Rule has been to test
the invariance of F, across a wide range of speaking variables. such as
speakers sex, speaking rate, and grammatical category of the measured
words (Cooper & Sorensen, 1981). The rules utility is also seen in the
analysis of F, resetting, which occurs when observed peak values are
greater than those predicted on the basis of the Topline Rule. However,
the Topline Rule presupposes declination as a property of the F,, peaks:
therefore it is not an ideal test of the declination slope per se.
Figure 3 shows the Topline Rule predictions for the four-peak and
five-peak sentences, along with the actual peak values produced by both
groups of subjects. Observe that F, resetting appears to occur at the
subject-predicate boundary (between P2 and P3) for both the Wernickes
and normal subjects in the five-peak sentences, yet only for the aphasic
It also should be noted that despite the relationship noted between extreme paraphasia
and the loss of declination in patient RD. the individual declination slopes of the remaining
four aphasic subjects were unrelated to the number of paraphasias that each subject
produced.
The declination slope for an N-peak sentence as defined by the Topline Rule is: 213
[(PN - Pl)/(TN
- TI)]. From this formula it is clear that if PI equals PN, the slope of
the declination line is zero. Thus the Topline Rule cannot be used to establish whether
or not the peaks in a given utterance actually decline: rather, it is used to predict peaks
intermediate to the initial and final peaks.

12

DANLY,
160 150 ;;

COOPER, AND SHAPIRO

4-PEAK

SENTENCES

:\

140 -

130 -

G
E

120 -

110 -

ks
&I.

100 -

160 -

150 -

ii
Q

140

2
3
Y

130 -

120 II0

100 -

Wernickes
Aphasics
Normal
Subjects
5-PEAK

SENTENCES

\
Y\

h;;\zts

PI

P2

P3
PEAK

P4

Subjects
P5

NUMBER

FIG. 3. F0 declination functions for the four-peak and five-peak sentences produced by
normal speakers and Wernickes aphasics. The Topline Rule indicates similar declination
slopes for the two groups of subjects. In addition, note that F,) resetting occurs at P3 for
both the Wernickes aphasics and the normal speakers in the long sentences, but only for
the aphasic subjects in the medium-length sentences (see text).

subjects in the four-peak sentences. This difference in resetting is examined

in more depth in the following section.
F. Resetting

Our three questions concerning F,, resetting may be summarized as

follows: (1) As in normal speech, does sentence length determine the
probability of F. resetting at the subject-predicate boundary (Cooper &
Sorensen, 1981); and if so, do Wernickes aphasics maintain an F. contour
over comparable amounts of material? (2) Do syntactic boundaries differing
in strength trigger distinct amounts of resetting for the Wernickes subjects?
(3) Do Wernickes aphasics maintain the distinction between boundaries
for which resetting is either appropriate or inappropriate?
The first question concerning sentence length and F0 resetting is answered
by the data graphed in Fig. 4. Analyzing the results using a repeatedmeasures two-way ANOVA (subject type x sentence length), we found
a significant main effect for sentence length, showing that F. resetting
was more likely to occur between the subject and predicate of long rather
than short sentences (F(2, 16) = 16.55, p < .OOl, q* = .67).3 The
Eta, symbolized 7. is an effect size estimator (providing an estimate of the proportion
of variance accounted for by the independent variable). which can be computed from the
following formula (Freidman. 1968: Fleiss. 1969): SS,,,,,,/(SS,,,,,, + SS,,,,,,). Eta provides

WERNICKES

APHASIA

Normal
Speakers
Wernickes
Aphasics
/

short

medium
SENTENCE

long
LENGTH

FIG. 4. The percentage of F,, resetting at the subject-predicate

boundaries
medium, and long sentences for normal speakers and Wernickes aphasics.

of short,

Wernickes aphasics produced approximately equal amounts of resetting

as the normal subjects in short and long sentences, but they produced
more resetting in the medium-length sentences, as revealed by a statistically
significant interaction between subject category and sentence length:
(F(2, 16) = 6.95, p < .Ol, $ = .47). We interpret this finding as follows.
Although Wernickes aphasics exhibit sensitivity to overall sentence length
as a determinant of F, resetting, the use of resetting in medium-length
sentences shows that their intonation contours span shorter-than-normal
domains.
Adding to the above finding, the aphasic subjects were unable to differentiate prosodically between two types of syntactic boundaries. While
the normal subjects reset at 60% of the subject-predicate boundaries in
the five-peak sentences, this value can be divided into two categories,
with 90% resetting for boundaries preceded by relative clauses (sentences
11 and 12) vs. 30% resetting for boundaries preceded by prepositional
phrases (sentences 9 and 10). This distinction was not present for the
Wernickes aphasics, who reset in equal amounts following relative clauses
and prepositional phrases (see Fig. 5). Tested as an interaction between
subject type and boundary type in a two-way repeated-measuresANOVA,
we found a significant interaction between the independent variables (F( 1,
8) = 6.00, p < .05, nz = .42). Like the resetting differences in mediumlength sentences, this contrast between normal and aphasic subjects
an estimate of the effect size, the sample size notwithstanding.
Because we are performing
significance tests at relatively low power with only 10 subjects. it may be useful to take
7 into account along with the probability values for each statistic when interpreting the
analyses.

14

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

7E 100
_
pz 00-

Normal
Speakers

L
E
a

60

--

----q
Wernickes

b 40

Aphasics

;/

z
it?
2 20
2
E
,
OPrepositional Phrase
BOUNDARY

,
Relative Clause
TYPE

FIG. 5. The percentage of F0 resetting following prepositional phrases (sentences 9, 10)

vs. relative clauses (sentences 11, 12) for normal speakers and Wernickes aphasics.

shows that, when subjected to acoustical analysis, the speech of Wernickes

aphasics exhibits a systematic deficit in FO.
In the third analysis of F0 resetting, we observed that resetting occurred
at atypical sentence locations in the aphasic subjects. To test the hypothesis
that resetting occurred more frequently at inappropriate locations, we
compared the frequency of resetting for subject-predicate boundaries
(appropriate) and other locations (inappropriate) for both groups of subjects.
Shown in Table 2, the results indicate a significant difference in the
proportion of appropriate vs. inappropriate F,, resettings produced by
the normal and Wernickes subjects (f(8) = 2.92, p < .02, r = .72).
Continuation Rises
Parallel to our analysis of F0 resetting, we examined the influence of
sentence length and syntactic boundaries on F0 continuation rises. The
results, graphed in Fig. 6, show a significant effect of sentence length
on the probability of continuation rises occurring at the subject-predicate
boundary. This effect was tested in a two-way repeated-measures ANOVA
(subject type x sentence length): F(2, 16) = 19.44, p < .OOl, q2 = .94.
The main effect for subject type approached significance (F(1, 8) = 4.60,
p = .06, n2 = .36), indicating that the Wernickes aphasics tended to
use continuation rises more frequently in general. This increased use of
continuation rises by the brain-damaged subjects occurred regardless of
sentence length, as shown by a nonsignificant interaction effect (F(2, 16)
= 1.22, p > .30, v2 = .13). These analyses suggest that the Wernickes
aphasics consider the length of constituents in planning and executing
speech by placing continuation rises following and preceding lengthier
phrases. Moreover, the increased use of continuation rises by the aphasic

WERNICKES

APHASIA

=
6FBO_
;

60-

F
6
u

40-

Wernickes
Aphasics
/
/
/ -Normal
/
Speakers

I
long

medium

short

SENTENCE

LENGTH

FIG. 6. The percentage of F0 continuation rises preceding the subject-predicate boundaries

of short, medium, and long sentences for normal speakers and Wernickes aphasics.

subjects indicates that they are generally more likely than normal speakers
to intonationally break up constituents.
Evidence for the aphasics lack of syntactic differentiation is shown
in Fig. 7 by the frequency of continuation rises in contrasting boundaries.
Examining the occurrence of continuation rises at prepositional and relative
clause boundaries in the five-peak sentences, it is evident that normal
speakers produced more continuation rises at the larger of the two syntactic
boundaries (the relative clause), whereas the Wernickes aphasics did
not. This interaction was tested in a two-way repeated-measures ANOVA
(subject type x boundary type), which revealed that the normal and
2

100 -

2
vr
a

k!

BO-

::
E

NOVlKll
Speakers

o- Prepositional

I
Phrase
BOUNDARY

Relative

Clause

TYPE

FIG. 7. The percentage of F. continuation rises following prepositional phrases (sentences

9, 10) vs. relative clauses (sentences II, 12) for normal speakers and Wernickes aphasics.

16

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

aphasic subjects tended to treat the contrast between the two boundaries
in different manners: F(1, 8) = 3.92, p = .08, n2 = .35. While this
interaction is not significant at (Y = .05, the effect size is relatively large.
Continuation rises, like F0 resetting, rarely occur at clause-internal
locations in normal speech. When they consistently occur at such locations,
they may reflect a defect in or the absence of a syntactic analysis of the
sentence. Table 2 compares the number of continuation rises normal and
aphasic subjects produce at the subject-predicate boundary (appropriate)
vs. other locations (inappropriate). The Wernickes aphasics were significantly more likely than normal subjects to produce continuation rises
at minor, within-clause boundaries (t(8) = 2.92, p < .02, Y = .72). This
finding allows two interpretations. One, the aphasics produced more
continuation rises at smaller though reasonable boundaries; that is,
their threshold for production of continuation rises is lower than normal,
although some syntactic hierarchy of boundaries exists, however rudimentary. Two, continuation rises occurred randomly within sentences,
without regard to syntactic boundary strength. For the five-peak sentences,
there was a total of 20 measured words, 16 of which occurred in positions
at which it is reasonable to produce continuation rises-that is, nonsentencefinal position. Of these 16 key words, 4 (25%) occur between the subject
and predicate, the strongest syntactic boundary. In these five-peak sentences, the Wernickes aphasics produced a total of 25 continuation rises,
14 (56%) of which occurred at the subject-predicate boundary, more
often than predicted by random placement. A matched-pairs t test comparing the frequency of continuation rises at major vs. minor boundaries
showed that they were significantly more likely to occur at the major
boundary (t(4) = 2.81, p < .05, Y = .64). In a parallel analysis of F0
resetting, we found that the Wernickes aphasics also reset intonation
contours significantly more often at the largest syntactic boundary of the
five-peak sentences: t(4) = 7.50, p < .Ol, r = .81. Thus, the findings
for F0 resetting and continuation rises, taken together, show that Wernickes
aphasics produce F0 patterns that reflect the distinction between major
and minor syntactic boundaries, though clear deficits exist in the processing
of complex structure.
The PI Effect
The results of the test of the PI effect revealed that the Wernickes
aphasics were able to combine the factors of sentence length and declination
in order to produce higher values of Pl for longer sentences. Both the
control and aphasic subjects produced PI values that were 5.8 Hz higher
for the long vs. the short sentences, which is a significant main effect
for sentence length in a two-way repeated-measures ANOVA (sentence

WERNICKES

APHASIA

17

length x subject type): F(1, 8) = 11.33, p < .Ol, r) = .59. As we have

seen for F0 declination, resetting, and continuation rises, fundamental
frequency remains intact when it depends on the purely sentential factor
of length.
Sentence-Final

F,, Full

We measured the magnitude of F, fall in sentence-final position in

order to compare it with F. fall in nonfinal key words. Table 2 lists the
mean word-final contours of Pl-4 in the four-peak sentences. A twoway repeated-measures ANOVA (word position x subject type), yielded
a significant main effect for word position: F(3, 12) = 6.99, p < .Ol, q
= .64. A t test comparing the final contour with the second largest
nonfinal contour showed that the final contour was indeed the largest F(,
fall in the four-peak sentences: t(4) = 4.77, p < .Ol, Y = $8.5.Analyses
of the three-peak and five-peak sentences yielded similar results: threepeak: t(4) = 5.06, p < .Ol, I = .86; five-peak: t(4) = 4.93, p < .Ol , t
= .86. The presence of the sentence-final contour in conjunction with
the nonappearance of large F,, falls earlier in the sentence, lends support
to the notion that Wernickes aphasics plan speech in units larger than
the single word. And since the sentence-final F,, fall is intact, we document
another spared feature of F, in Wernickes aphasia. However, note that
the magnitude of the final F. fall for the aphasic subjects in the fourpeak sentences averaged 46 Hz, greater than the normal fall of 26 Hz.
Similar results were obtained for the three-peak and five-peak sentences,
with the final fall averaging 48 Hz for the aphasic speakers and 24 Hz
for the normal speakers. In the following section we report the differences
between normal and aphasic speakers in terms of F,, variability.
F, Variability

and Speech Rate

A certain amount of F,, fluctuation between peaks and valleys is normal

(23 Hz/word in the present sample). But acoustical analysis of the Wernickes speech reveals that they produced twice as much F,, variability,
46 Hz/word, as the normal subjects. An ANOVA comparing F,, variability
in the two groups of subjects showed a highly significant difference in
the group means: F(l, 8) = 47.74, ,LJ< .OOl, q2 = .86. As mentioned
above in the discussion of the sentence-terminal contour, the Wernickes
aphasic subjects produced a much larger F,, fall in sentence-final position
than the normal subjects. A t test revealed this difference to be significant:
The present result is in contrast with the negative finding for the PI effect reported
in the preliminary
study (Cooper et al.. 1979). This difference stems from the following
methodological
change: Originally. we tested IO control subjects, all MIT undergraduates.
whose PI effect was 13.5 Hz-larger
than the .5.8-Hz PI effect of the current control
subjects. This difference in results is most likely due to the fact that the current control
subjects are better matched in both age and educational level to the experimental subjects.

18

DANLY,

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AND

SHAPIRO

t(8) = 5.60, p < .OOl, r = .89. Moreover, the magnitude of continuation

rises averaged 15 Hz for the Wernickes aphasics, compared to only 6
Hz for the normal subjects. This difference was also statistically significant:
t(8) = 4.84, p < .Ol, r = .88. These differences in the magnitude of F0
variability, sentence-terminal contour, and continuation rises suggest that
Wernickes aphasics generally exaggerate within-word F, fluctuation. In
contrast, the comparable declination slopes for the normal and aphasic
subjects suggest that across-word F,, patterns are not emphasized.
As reported above, the Wernickes aphasics produced each sentence
in 6.47 set vs. 3.35 set for the normal subjects. While this difference is
significant (t(8) = 6.06, p < .OOl, r = .91), it should be remembered
that this result does not necessarily imply that the Wernickes aphasics
were nonfluent. Because we employed a practiced reading paradigm in
which the subjects were required to conform to a prespecified set of
utterances, the resultant speech rate cannot be directly compared to
established rates for spontaneous speech (e.g., Howes, 1964). The Wernickes subjects pauses accounted for almost three times as much of
the total speaking time as the normal subjects pauses, whereas word
durations were approximately 50% longer. For both the phonation time
and silent intervals these differences were significant (phonation: t(8) =
3.84, p < .Ol, r = .80; silence: t(8) = 3.41, p < .Ol, Y = .77).
The number of paraphasias produced by each aphasic subject was
significantly correlated with speech rate: r(3) = .972, p < .Ol. Butterworth
(1979) has shown that paraphasic and neologistic utterances were more
likely to be preceded by pauses in a jargon aphasic, a finding that is
consistent with the above statistic and the following correlation. For the
three-peak sentences, paraphasias were significantly correlated with interpeak latency (r(38) = .48, p < .Ol), pointing more directly to paraphasias
as a possible source of slow speech rate in Wernickes aphasia. However,
it may be that both of these correlations are entirely due to betweensubjects effects. The more rapid speech and shorter interpeak latencies
may have been produced by the three mildly paraphasic subjects, ES,
WH, and SM; similarly, the slow speech and long interpeak latencies
may be attributable to the severely paraphasic subject, RD. This latter
hypothesis is supported by the lack of correlation of paraphasia to interpeak
latency in a within-subject analysis of LMc: t(46) = .96, p > .20, r =
- .14. Nor does an analysis of LMcs hesitation pauses (following Butterworth, 1979), yield any relationship between paraphasias and hesitation
pauses: x(1) = .25, p > .20, 4 = .08. Thus at least for the present
testing paradigm and subject population, we are unable to establish a
direct effect of paraphasia on speech timing.
Yet, as noted by Butterworth, neologisms rather than paraphasias are
more likely to be associated with hesitation pauses, leading to an analysis
of hesitation pauses and neologisms in the speech of LMc. Butterworths

WERNICKES

APHASIA

19

observation matches our findings for this subject. Compared to real words,
neologisms were significantly more likely to be preceded by pauses of
250 msec or greater: x2(1) = 4.80; p < .05; 4 = .38. We therefore
replicate Butterworths finding for neologisms with a Wernickes aphasic
in the practiced reading paradigm. Moreover, we establish a dissociation
between the programming of two prosodic features: speech timing and
F0 declination (upon which neologisms apparently had no effect).S This
difference between the two prosodic features indicates the independence
of their relationships to lexical selection in Wernickes aphasia.
DISCUSSION

From the constellation of F. attributes discussed above, it is clear that

Wernickes aphasics exhibit systematic patterns of F-some intact, others
impaired. Therefore, strictly speaking, the clinical impression of normal
prosody is incorrect, though the deviations from normal prosody may
be imperceptible. Yet many elements of F, are spared, which may be
summarized as follows.
When less severely disordered, Wemickes aphasics produce a significant
F0 declination. However, we detected no declination in the speech of
the most impaired aphasic subject. The Wernickes aphasics produce
higher starting F0 values for longer sentences than for shorter ones,
consistent with the PI effect found for normal speakers. This finding
indicates the speakers ability to combine information about sentence
length and declination slope in order to correctly program the appropriate
F0 value for the first peak. We note the contrast between Wernickes
and Brocas aphasics in this regard. Despite the presence of limited F,
declination, Brocas aphasics do not exhibit the PI effect (Danly &
Shapiro, 1982). It is likely that this difference in the two subject populations
is due to the tenuous presence of F,, declination in the Brocas aphasics.
We found that the declination slope was correlated with the severity of
language disorder, and a normal slope was present in only one of the
five Brocas aphasics. In contrast, four of the five Wernickes aphasics
in the present study produced F,, declination, the slope of which was
unrelated to the degree of impairment, as assessed by the BDAE. Since
the Pl effect is dependent on declination, we consider the contrast between
the two populations to be a logical outcome of their declination differences.
Three other F0 properties are spared in Wernickes aphasia: sentencefinal F, fall and the sentential aspects of F,, resetting and continuation
rises. As in normal speech, sentence length determines the likelihood of
This finding was established by computing the following regressions using subject LMc:
After regressing F,) on peak number, initial peak. syntactic boundary. and sentence length,
neither the resulting residuals nor their squares were correlated to neologism (for neologisms
and the residuals. ~(27) = .02, p > .SO: for neologisms and the squared residuals, r(27)
= .14, p > ,401.

20

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

F0 resetting and continuation rises at the subject-predicate boundary.

Taken together, the presence of F0 declination, the Pl effect, sentencefinal F, fall, F0 resetting, and continuation rises, indicate that Wernickes
aphasics produce normal F0 patterns, in particular when F0 is governed
by global, sentential factors.
The impaired prosodic features reveal interesting abnormalities in the
sentence production strategies and in the use of syntactic structure in
Wernickes aphasia. The abnormal F,, patterns include the occurrence
of F0 resetting in shorter sentences and at minor syntactic boundaries,
increased use of continuation rises (which also occur at minor syntactic
boundaries), and increased F0 variability. In addition, Wernickes aphasics
fail to use F, to signal the difference between syntactic boundaries whose
constituent structures are different. These findings demonstrate the limitations of perceptual rather than acoustical studies of speech prosody
(e.g., Duchon, Stengel, & Oliva, 1980), in which either absent, impaired,
or exaggerated F0 properties may remain undetected.
The relationship between the clinical profiles and F,, measures of the
subjects studied here suggests that many F,, deficits are not apparent to
the listener. All five Wernickes aphasics received the highest possible
score on the BDAE in the categories of grammatical form (normal range),
articulatory agility (never impaired), and phrase length (seven cards).
Four of the five subjects received the highest rating for the category of
melodic line (YWZZS
through the entire sentence), including subject RD,
who did not produce F0 declination at all. From these clinical observations
we remark that subtle F0 impairments are difficult to detect without the
aid of acoustical instruments. Moreover, these impaired F0 attributes
enable more precise judgments to be made about phrase length and
grammatical form.
We link the impaired F0 measures to three distinct sources. One cause,
impaired language processing capacity, would lead to shorter domains
of F, declination. Wernickes aphasic speakers divide sentences into
smaller processing units than normal speakers do, as evidenced by the
finding that F, resetting occurs more often within sentences of only
moderate length, while its occurrence in such locations is rare in normal
speech. It is possible that this effect is not present in spontaneous speech
but is actually due to an eye-voice span limitation in the reading of
Wernickes aphasics (e.g., Gibson & Levin, 1975). Further study of
spontaneous speech should reveal whether frequent F, resetting is merely
a methodological artifact. Even if this were the case, syntactic or planning
deficits would not necessarily be ruled out, since the eye-voice span is
dependent on such factors as syntactic competence and memory (Gibson
& Levin, 1975).
Wernickes aphasics generally produce continuation rises more often
than normal speakers. Since continuation rises occur only following major

WERNICKES

APHASIA

21

constituents in normal speech (assuming that continuation rises serve

the same function in aphasic speech), we may conclude that Wernickes
aphasics have a more limited capacity for sentence processing. As further
evidence of the increased segmentation of sentences, we find that aphasic
speakers are more likely to produce F, resetting and continuation rises
at minor syntactic boundaries. In other words, aphasic speakers prosodically divide sentences at appropriate boundaries, though more frequently than normal speakers; they also reset F, and produce continuation
rises at minor syntactic boundaries, which is atypical of normal speech.
A second cause of faulty F,,, impaired syntactic competence, may lead
to the failure of Wernickes aphasics to distinguish between two types
of syntactic boundaries. While normal speakers reset F0 and produce
continuation rises more often following sentence-internal relative clauses
than prepositional phrases, the aphasics consistently failed to do so. It
is impossible to account for the Wernickes aphasics lack of F, differentiation in their inability to use either of the two prosodic features,
since sentence length clearly determines the probability of both F,, resetting
and continuation rises in these subjects. Therefore, we infer that similar
amounts of resetting and continuation rises reflect a faulty syntactic
representation of the sentences.
A third possible factor underlying F0 abnormality in Wernickes aphasia
is impaired articulatory control of F,, in sentence production. Kreindler.
Calvarezo, and Mihailescu (1971, cited in Lesser, 1978) claim that one
jargon aphasics excessive use of rhythm and rhyme reflected the patients
inability to structure sentences semantically. While this explanation of
F, impairment is plausible, it alone does not directly account for increased
F, variability per se. We suggest that the Wernickes aphasics use of
emphatic stress leads to increased F,, variability. Although Wernickes
aphasics are perceptually able to detect stress patterns (as evidenced in
research by Blumstein & Goodglass (1972) and the present subjects
response to the experimenters instructions), they are unable to reduce
emphatic stress when producing sentences. As Lehiste (1970) notes,
stressed words are accompanied by higher F,) values, which could presumably increase F, variability. This observation is supported by the
fact that the Wernickes subjects tended either to overly stress content
words or to initiate sentences with very high levels of amplitude. However,
the stress account for increased F, variability does not explain the exaggeration of sentence-final contours and continuation rises, which do
not necessarily occur on stressed syllables. Although the aphasic subjects
F,, was approximately 10 Hz higher than the normal subjects F,,, the
final peak of sentences produced by Wernickes aphasics was not so
much greater as to explain the 23-Hz difference in the magnitude of
normal and aphasic sentence-final contours. To understand fully the hypermelodic quality of speech in Wernickes aphasia may require further

22

DANLY,

COOPER,

AND

SHAPIRO

study of the factors that influence FO variability in normal speech; in

addition, the explanation is likely to relate to interdependencies in the
control of the three aspects of speech prosody, F,, timing, and amplitude.
Having argued that limited speech planning and abnormal syntactic
structure are related to F, deficits, we wish to consider the scope of
these impairments. Given the well-documented speech production abilities
of Wernickes aphasics (Goodglass & Kaplan, 1972; Goodglass & Geschwind, 1976; Hecaen & Albert, 1978), it is obvious that they retain significant
abilities in the domains of planning and syntax. Supporting the notion
of speech planning, we find that for normal and aphasic speech the largest
F,, fall occurs in sentence-final position. We claim that the smaller FO
falls on previous words indicate that the speaker intends to continue the
utterance. In terms of syntax, Wernickes aphasics ably demonstrate that
the major syntactic division in sentences occurs at the subject-predicate
boundary, despite their lack of F, resetting and continuation rises in
accordance with more complex syntactic boundaries. Therefore, in both
domains-speech planning and syntactic structure-we find that Wernickes
aphasics express basic characteristics in conjunction with systematic
impairments.
Despite difficulties encountered in lexical selection, Wernickes aphasics
do not exhibit any observable deficits in F,, when producing paraphasias
and neologisms. We note, however, that neologisms are likely to follow
hesitation pauses, in agreement with Butterworths (1979) claim. This
finding points to the independence of the mechanisms underlying FO
programming and speech timing, observed for Brocas aphasics (Danly
& Shapiro, 1982). These statements are based on a within-subject analysis
of a moderately impaired Wernickes aphasic; it is possible that FO is
dependent on paraphasias and neologisms, though in different subtypes
or severities of aphasia (Lecours & Rouillon, 1976).
This investigation demonstrates that the acoustical analysis of FO can
serve as a useful instrument in the study of aphasia. Both normal and
abnormal FOpatterns give insight into the structure and function of language.
The conclusions reached here could well be amended or augmented by
the study of different subject populations, an increase in the sample size,
the examination of F,, in spontaneous speech, and the combined study
of sentence comprehension and FO production. In conclusion, it is clear
that Wernickes aphasics produce FOconfigurations which reveal shorterthan-normal domains of speech planning and certain syntactic limitations.
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