Aprosodia and alexithymia--a case report

Aprosodias are disorders of affective language and behavior resulting from focal lesions of the right hemisphere. Patients devoid of prosody are unable to endow their language with emotion and feeling. They may show a lack of spontaneous prosody or gesturing. Alexithymia is a cognitive-affective disturbance which includes difficulty in recognizing and describing feelings and emotional states. Alexithymic patients have a diminished inner fantasy life and constricted emotional activity sometimes exhibited in a rigid posture and lack of expressive facial movements. Thus, both aprosodia and alexithymia to some extent are disorders of affective language and behavior. The patient discussed below had a motor aprosodia and can be described as having alexithymic features. The relationship between aprosodia and alexithymia and possible neurophysiological implications for the latter condition are examined.