Comments on “Morphosyntactic Deficits in Malayalam-Speaking Broca's Aphasics”

Abstract

phosyntactic Deficits in Malayalam-Speaking Broca’s Aphasics” published in this journal (Aithal, Veena, James, & Rajashekar, 2009). The authors deserve great appreciation for undertaking this study in less explored Indian languages such as Malayalam. However, certain shortcomings of the study are worth considering. First, the subjects selected in the study had a mean age of 40 years (range: 25–55 years) which may not be the true representation of the distribution of people with aphasia in the general population. For instance, a recent study (Sridharan et al., 2009) revealed that the median age of stroke was 67 years in Kerala (where the present study was conducted). Although the apparently lower mean age in Aithal et al.’s study is not a limitation per se, the authors could have cautioned the readers on the generalization of the present findings in the discussion. Furthermore, under the “subjects” section of “Methods,” some vital information such as: (a) the postonset of time, (b) whether the subjects underwent language therapy, and if so, (c) how long, and (d) how frequently (e.g., Nicholas, Helm-Estabrooks, WardLonergan, & Morgan, 1993; Pederson, Joergensen, Nakayama, Raaschou, & Skyhoj Olsen, T., 1995) could have been more useful for the generalization of the results. Aithal et al. (2009) stated that the subjects had a score of 4 in spontaneous speech fluency. According to the norms of Western Aphasia Battery, the fluency scores of nonfluent aphasia could range from 0 to 4. In this context, it is apparent that the subjects of the present study were in the borderline of nonfluent to fluent aphasic categories. The previous study in Kannada to which the authors have compared their findings included subjects with fluency scores ranging from 0 to 4. Therefore, the claimed difference between Malayalamand Kannada-speaking subjects with Broca’s aphasia may be attrib-