Characteristics of Story Grammar in Fluent Aphasic Patients

Background & Objectives: Evaluation of storytelling skills may provide information about the storytellers' linguistic knowledge as well as cognitive and social-emotional abilities. One assessment method for storytelling, story grammar includes six sets of rules commonly found in stories. The adequate use of these six categories of story grammar provides insight into the abilities of aphasic patients. The purpose of this study was to examine story grammar in fluent aphasic patients through storytelling of a Korean folk tale, 'Heung-bu and Nol-bu'. Methods: The subjects included 15 fluent aphasic patients with left-hemispheric stroke and 15 adults without any cognitive impairment. We compared story grammar total and subcategory scores, and the percentage of usage of six story grammars as well as the total number of episodes. Results: The aphasic groups had lower total story grammar scores, lower subcategory scores, and fewer total number of episodes. The two groups did not differ significantly within the subcategories with the exceptions of inner response and response. Discussion & Conclusion: Although aphasic patients may understand the concepts of story structure and core story grammar, they may demonstrate impaired abilities to explain stories in a meaningful way. Aphasic patients are able to provide explicit information but generally have difficulties providing implicit information.