ABSTRACT
This chapter attempts to collate certain data for an analysis of the disorders underlying the type of speech defect. The patient retains the motor and sensory components of speech and can easily name objects and repeat words and even sentences, but is totally unable to utter independent, expanded statements. There is evidence to indicate that a defect in the predicative functions of speech lies at the basis of the disorder. L. S. Vygotsky hypothesized that inner speech is a mechanism used by the subject for the transition from the initial conception to an expanded verbal statement. How can we verify the hypothesis? There are two possible ways: a negative one, and a positive one. The first way is to give the patient the individual words that are necessary for constructing a sentence without giving him the linear scheme of the sentence. In the second way we give the patient the linear scheme of a sentence without the individual specific words.
