Lexical-semantic organization: evidence from aphasia.

The emerging field of clinical neuroscience requires the combination of diverse theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of brain function. The study of neurogenic language disorders has played a central role in the development of models of language/brain relationships. These contributions are reviewed with regard to the study of word processing impairments in aphasia, where data from brain-damaged patients has been used to guide the development of models of lexical/semantic organization. It is argued that the study of aphasic patients will continue to occupy a central role in both neuroscience and clinical research as new technologies are developed for functional brain imaging and as theoretically driven treatments for aphasia are designed and tested.