ABSTRACT
People with severe aphasia respond poorly to impairment-based therapy designed to improve language function (Marshall, Tompkins, & Phillips, 1982; Sarno, Silverman, & Sands, 1970). Instead, therapies with this group have promoted the use of alternative communication modalities such as gesture (Mcintosh & Dakin, 1989), pantomime (Rao, 1986) or a visual symbol system (Funnell & Allport, 1989). In this vein, interest has grown in using drawing as an alternative or augmentative communication tool, with some success being reported. Improvements have been documented in both drawing skill (Kearns & Yoder, 1992; Morgan & Helm-Estabrooks, 1987) and communicative drawing (Lyon & Sims, 1989; Trupe, 1986).
