Thalamic and Striatocapsular Bilingual Aphasia

Abstract In the present study, the linguistic performances of 8 bilingual aphasics with subcortical lesions in striatocapsular or thalamic areas have been assessed by means of Bilingual Aphasia Test. Based on this limited collected data, it is suggested that: (1) The thalamus and striatocapsular area have a more important role in production than comprehension and also in the processing of grammatically complex structures; (2) Speech production and comprehension are more severely impaired following striatocapsular lesions than thalamic lesions, whereas “naming” might be more impaired as a result of thalamic lesions; (3) Degree of proficiency and the language of patient's environment may not correlate with the pattern of recovery, whereas the age of second language acquisition might correlate with the pattern of recovery in subcortical bilingual aphasia; (4) It is likely that the second language acquired at an older age is represented more subcortically than the first language; and (5) In bilinguals, language is subcortically lateralized in the left striatocapsular and thalamic areas.