LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 15:5 May 2015
ISSN 1930-2940

Managing Editor: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
Editors: B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. A. Sharada, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         Lakhan Gusain, Ph.D.
         Jennifer Marie Bayer, Ph.D.
         S. M. Ravichandran, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         L. Ramamoorthy, Ph.D.
         C. Subburaman, Ph.D. (Economics)
         N. Nadaraja Pillai, Ph.D.
Assistant Managing Editor: Swarna Thirumalai, M.A.

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Speech Intelligibility in Ataxic Dysarthria Due to
Lesions in Different Cerebellar Loci

Dr. V. P. Vandana
Dr. R. Manjula

Abstract

Ataxic dysarthria is caused due to damage to the cerebellum. Articulatory inaccuracy is one of the characteristics of ataxic dysarthria. However not all lesions to the cerebellum affects the articulatory subsystem. In this study we attempted to analyse the speech intelligibility in patients with cerebellar lesions in different loci. A word list in Malayalam was prepared for this purpose and the patients were asked to read the list. This was recorded and later analysed for speech patterns. Very few vowel and consonantal errors were observed in few subjects only of the experimental groups. Errors were mostly seen for the consonants /r/, /?/, /?/ and /?/. No lesion specific trend could be observed based on the findings. The findings throw light on the need for more detailed analysis at the level of narration and discourse sample in this population.

Key words: Ataxic dysarthria, speech intelligibility

Introduction

Dysarthria is a motor speech disorder that results from neurological impairments associated with weakness, slowness, or incoordination of the musculature used to produce speech (Kent, 2000). In dysarthria, the subsystems of speech production mechanism, such as respiratory, phonatory, articulatory, resonatory and prosody are affected to a degree which is dependent on the type of dysarthria. Dysarthria caused due to damage to the cerebellar structure of the brain is called ataxic dysarthria.

Initially, ataxic dysarthria was considered as a homogenous disorder. But the contemporary view is that ataxic dysarthria is not a homogenous disorder. This observation is based on findings which suggest that the areas / loci of the cerebellum have a differential role in speech motor control (Duffy, 1995; Kent et al., 2000). Articulatory inaccuracy is one of the characteristics of ataxic dysarthria, though it may not be seen in all subjects with ataxic dysarthria.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

V. P. Vandana
Assistant Professor of Speech Pathology and Audiology
Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology
National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences
Bangalore - 560029
Karnataks
India
vpvandana@gmail.com

Dr. R. Manjula
Professor of Speech Pathology
Department of Speech Pathology
All India Institute of Speech and Hearing
Manasagangothri
Mysore - 570006
Karnataka
India
r_manjula@yahoo.com
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