Estratégias de evocação lexical com critério semântico em adultos após acidente vascular cerebral no hemisfério direito / Semantic verbal fluency strategies in patients after a right-hemisphere stroke

Semantic verbal fluency tasks (SVF) evaluate the ability to generate words from a given criterion in a specified time; these tasks allow for the investigation of language, memory and executive functions. This study aimed to investigate the performance of right hemisphere (RH) post stroke adults in an SVF task. Eleven adults with RH lesion and eleven healthy adults, matched by sex, education and age, were investigated. The participants completed an SVF task (clothes names); the total number of words, clustering and switching variables, and the conformation of semantic networks were measured through computational analysis. We found significant statistical differences in the total number of words (Z score). Topographic analysis of graphs showed a tendency toward smaller semantic networks in the RH lesion group compared with controls. Case series analyzes showed four individuals with deficits in the total number of words and in switching. These participants had predominantly frontal lobe and subcortical lesions, which indicates the interference of lesion-specific locations in the use of SVF strategies. The qualitative analyses presented are groundbreaking for the Brazilian context. We also note the importance of using comparisons between groups and case series analyzes in cognitive neuropsychology investigations.