A study of associations between Cognition and Language: What can Cognitive Screening Section of the Comprehensive Aphasia Test (CAT) provide?

The questions of how language and cognition affect each other, and of how and to what extent cognitive skills of individuals with aphasia are impaired, are controversial (Hamsher, 1991; Tatemichi et al., 1994). These issues are important for the speech and language therapist (SLT), in order to be able to formulate working hypotheses and to determine the most effective therapy/intervention. The Comprehensive Aphasia Test (CAT; Swinburn, Porter & Howard, 2004) includes a Cognitive Screen (CAT-CS) and should, therefore, be a useful tool for SLTs. We report the results of descriptive and comparative analyses on the cognitive skills of Turkish-speaking people with aphasia (PWA) and their association with the participants’ language skills using data from a validation study of the Turkish adaptation of the CAT.