Verb and noun double dissociation : the adaptation of the object and action naming battery into Moroccan Arabic (Casablanca-Settat region dialect)

Abstract

This thesis makes a case study on the Action – Object naming tests: Druks & Masterson (2000) and provides preliminary work for its adaptation in Moroccan Arabic. The Action – Object naming test consists of a set of one hundred pictures depicting actions and 162 depicting objects. This test helps detecting word retrieval deficiency in aphasic patients, as well as specifying its nature. The standardization of this test will serve not only clinicians, but also theoretical linguists to obtain reliable linguistic data that can be compared to the already existing copra of English, and that can contribute to the ongoing debates regarding universal language theories. The first part of the thesis presents an overview of the history of the confrontation naming tests, and how their normative data was developed. It also explains the properties and usefulness of having such a normative. Finally, this part describes the properties of the Object- Action naming test developed by Druks & Masterson (2000). The second part of the thesis offers an overview of the linguistic theories of verbs and nouns dissociations taking evidence from studies on different kinds of aphasia and of the results obtained with English speaking patients of different varieties of English. It then analyses the language and cultural discrepancies found in its adaptation in other languages. The third part is a pilot study of the standardization of the Object Action naming to be carried out in the region of Casablanca-Settat, Morocco for the first time in the country. The pictures will be standardized on four psycholinguistic variables of the concept: Name agreement (NA), Age of Acquisition, Imageability, Frequency and two of the pictures: Visual complexity and Familiarity.