Article
Development and standardization of a test for the comprehension of nouns and verbs in Russian: Data from individuals with and without aphasia
Abstract. There is currently a great need for modern, standardized neuropsychological tests for language assessment in Russian speakers with aphasia. Our group is working on the development of the Russian Aphasia Test (RAT). Within the scope of this work, two subtests for single-word comprehension of nouns and verbs were developed considering contemporary models of language processing and principles of psychometrics. The task for both subtests was spoken word-to-picture matching. The subtests were normed on individuals with aphasia (n = 45) and a control group (n = 30). This resulted in the final set of 30 diagnostic trials for nouns and verbs matched on relevant psychometric properties which are sensitive to language impairments for both fluent and non-fluent types of aphasia. This set of trials will be included in the final version of the RAT.
Currently there is a need for standardized language assessment test in Russian. Our group has developed Russian Aphasia Test (RAT) based on modern psycholinguistic models and psychometric principles, taking into account existing standardized tests in other languages. RAT allows to separately assess each level of linguistic processing: from phonemic perception to discourse. Here we present the design of the test and the first results of its approbation in groups of neurologically healthy participants and individuals with aphasia. Preliminary results demonstrated that the test is sensitive to language deficits and their severity. Thus, RAT is a practical instrument for language assessment in aphasia which can be used both in clinical practice and for research purposes. At present test standardization in a large group of participants with and without aphasia is on-going with the goal of developing appropriate clinical and age norms.
There is a lack of modern quantitative language assessment tests in Russian, integrating neuropsychological and psychometric traditions, and allowing to specify the type and severity of linguistic deficits in individuals with different aphasia profiles. In response to these clinical and research needs, a novel standardized aphasia test – the Russian Aphasia Test (RAT) – is currently being developed.
There is great need for modern neuropsychological standardized tests for language assessment in aphasia in Russian. Our group is working on the development of the Russian Aphasia Test (RAT), Here we provide data on standardization of the subtests for single-word comprehension of actions and objects. The task for the both subtests was a word-picture matching task. The subtests were normed on people with aphasia and the control group. This resulted in the final set of 30 diagnostic trails for actions and objects matched on relevant psychometric properties that will be included in the final version of the RAT.
The paper is focused on the study of reaction of italian literature critics on the publication of the Boris Pasternak's novel "Doctor Jivago". The analysys of the book ""Doctor Jivago", Pasternak, 1958, Italy" (published in Russian language in "Reka vremen", 2012, in Moscow) is given. The papers of italian writers, critics and historians of literature, who reacted immediately upon the publication of the novel (A. Moravia, I. Calvino, F.Fortini, C. Cassola, C. Salinari ecc.) are studied and analised.
The Incongruity Theory of Humor in its different forms states that the cause of laughter is the perception of something that violates our mental patterns and expectations. It seems particularly true of comic absurdity which is based on a deadpan violation of established norms of logic and convention. The current paper explores linguistic mechanisms that underlie the comic effects in the works of Mikhail Zoshchenko, one of the great satirists of Soviet Russia. Zoshchenko is well-known for his simplified writing style which imitates the language and mentality of “the simple people” while at the same time mocking the nascent Soviet officialdom and its demands for the popular accessibility of art. The paper considers Zoshchenko’s narrative through the prism of conventional implicatures (Grice 1961, Karttunen and Peters 1979, Horn 2004, Potts 2005, 2007), or meanings that are not directly stated in the utterances, but implied by the speaker; e.g. Even John solved the problem implies that it was it was not expected of John to solve it. In successful communication, implicit meanings form the shared background of conversational partners; violation of these shared norms may be used to create comical effect. One of the most conventionalized societal norms and one Zoshchenko most frequently violates is the value of human life and, hence, solemn attitude to death. The narrator in Zoshchenko’s stories repeatedly implies otherwise, thus creating a comical portrait of the mentality of Homo Soveticus. Consider a quote from “The story about a greedy dairy woman”: “So, her husband died. At first she probably took it lightly. - A-a, she thought – no big deal… But then she realized – yes, this is a big deal!... Eligible bachelors are not running around in bunches. And then, of course, she started grieving” (shift in emphasis; the cause for grief is not the husband’s death but its inconvenience for the surviving wife). The story “A restless old man” (about an old man who lives in a communal flat and falls into lethargic stupor taken by his family and neighbors for death and then after waking up really dies) is based on violating the same conventional implicature. Throughout the story the narrator implicitly creates the image of death as an inconvenient occurrence and of a deceased person as an unwanted piece of waste. The harshly comic effect is achieved by implicatures about the shallow emotional impact of death (“And then of course there is aggravation: because the room is small and here is a superfluous element”, “If my husband, this surviving idiot, ordered the hearse right away, then the wait for it would have only been three days”; “The summoned doctor reassured everybody that now the old man is bona fide dead”); by violation of semantic compatibility rules whereby the seemingly dead old man is alternately referred to as an animate being (“The dead man is lying and demanding the last tribute to be paid to him”, “The babysitter is afraid to be in the room where a dead person is living”) or inanimate object (“There is so little space that there is even nowhere to pile up the old man”; “I am going to pile him up in the hall, let him wait for the hearse there”).
In the article the patterns of the realization of emotional utterances in dialogic and monologic speech are described. The author pays special attention to the characteristic features of the speech of a speaker feeling psychic tension and to the compositional-pragmatic peculiarities of dialogic and monologic text.