The economy of fluent speaking: Phrase-level reduction in a patient with pure apraxia of speech

摘要

The term phrase-level reduction refers to transformations of the phonetic forms of words in connected speech. They are a characteristic property of fluent speech in normal speakers. Phrase-level reductions contribute to a reduction of articulatory-motor effort and constitute an important aspect of speech naturalness. So far, these phenomena have not been subject to clinical investigations in patients with apraxia of speech. Since apraxia of speech is considered a phonetic encoding deficit, this condition might interfere with the mechanisms involved in phrase-level reduction. In this study we investigated the types and frequencies of reduction phenomena in an individual with pure apraxia of speech and compared it with normative data from two control speakers. Analyses were based on large samples of spontaneous speech. The results are discussed against the background of theoretical accounts of phraselevel reduction.