ABSTRACT
In this chapter, I shall consider an important problem faced by aphasia therapy efficacy studies, an issue that we—in collaboration with Professor Luigi Vignolo—started to study some 40 years ago at the neurological clinic of Milan University, where a few years earlier an aphasia rehabilitation centre had been opened. Many different techniques and experimental designs have been employed in an effort to solve the thorny problem of aphasia therapy efficacy, but no general agreement has been reached, notwithstanding the increasing body of evidence that aphasia therapy works. Some researchers still maintain that the reported studies are not experimentally sound and that their results cannot be taken as evidence; they say that such studies should be based on randomized, controlled trials (RCTs). I am not going to discuss whether or not RCTs provide the best scientific method for the assessment of aphasia treatment efficacy, but I shall focus on a different problem: the need to define the disorder to be treated and the treatment to be evaluated before evaluating its efficacy.
