Originally published by Plenum press, New York in 1995Softcovcr reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 1995 10 987654321
All rights reservedNo part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, microfilming, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the Publisher Preface A quarter century ago, one of the authors undertook the task of surveying research and theory in an area that, for lack of a more precise designation, was called "language behavior and psychopathology." The book published under the same title addressed those precincts of language behavior wherein the interests of the psychologist, psychiatrist, linguist, and speech pathologist showed some tendencies toward convergence. The principal focus was on aspects of language and paralanguage-variously, and on the whole, indifferently referred to as "deviation," "anomalies," "aberrations," or "disturbances" -that occur with sufficient frequency in relation to certain categories of personality disorders that they have long occupied a prominent (and coritroversial) place in the psychodiagnostic process.Language Behavior and Psychopathology (1969) made clear to the reader that it did not deal with such primary patterns of language disturbance as aphasia and stuttering. This was not to deny the relevance of psychopathological considerations in such language disorders. The importance of emotional conflict in the pathogenesis of stuttering had been amply documented, and there was abundant clinical evidence that aphasic patients might react adversely to their lowered or altered capacities'in symbolizing and communicating, even to the extent of exhibiting what Kurt Goldstein called a "catastrophic reaction." Regardless, however, of any psychopathological factors that may be present in aphasia or stuttering, both are essentially linguistic disorders. Their principal symptoms are manifested in vocal speech, and their treatment requires some or a great deal of speech therapy and retraining.On the other hand, as the book sought to emphasize, the linguistic and v vi Preface paralinguistic phenomena that occur as concomitants to conventional psychiatric syndromes might be characterized more accurately as language symptoms than as language disturbances. Clinical descriptions of personality disorders prominently feature descriptions of language and paralinguistic behavior. Anyone questioning this statement need only try to imagine the difficulties presented by the psychodiagnostic assessment of a patient bereft of speech. Much, if not most, diagnostic test behavior is language behavior, and among the chief criteria for gauging therapeutic progress is change in language behavior.If there was a common orientation toward language and communication behavior in the psychopathological context, it expressed itself in two objectives. The first was an attempt to arrive at a precise description of the way or ways that individuals diagnosed as belonging to a particular nos...