This book is a comprehensive review of the main acquired disorders of reading: hemianopic, pure and central alexia. The authors review the diagnostic criteria for each of the different types of disorder, and the efficacy of the therapeutic studies that have attempted to remediate them. The different theoretical models of adult reading, which largely rest on how the reading system responds to injury, are also discussed and evaluated. Focal brain injury caused by stroke and brain tumors are discussed in depth as are the effects of dementia on reading.

This book starts with a chapter on normal reading, followed by chapters on hemianopic alexia, pure alexia and central alexia, each structured in the same way, with: a description of the condition; a historical review of cases to date; psychophysics; consideration of the causative lesions; evidence from functional imaging studies on patients and, most importantly, a review of the evidence base for treating each condition. Finally, there is a chapter on how patient data has informed how we think about reading.

"Alexia: Diagnosis, Treatment and Theory" is aimed at neuropsychologists (both experimental and clinical), neurologists, speech therapists and others who deal with patients whose reading has been affected by an acquired brain injury, as well as interested students studying language disorders.

This book is a comprehensive review of the main acquired disorders of reading: hemianopic, pure and central alexia. The authors review the diagnostic criteria for each of the different types of disorder, and the efficacy of the therapeutic studies that have attempted to remediate them. The different theoretical models of adult reading, which largely rest on how the reading system responds to injury, are also discussed and evaluated. Focal brain injury caused by stroke and brain tumors are discussed in depth as are the effects of dementia on reading. This book starts with a chapter on normal reading, followed by chapters on hemianopic alexia, pure alexia and central alexia, each structured in the same way, with: a description of the condition; a historical review of cases to date; psychophysics; consideration of the causative lesions; evidence from functional imaging studies on patients and, most importantly, a review of the evidence base for treating each condition. Finally, there is a chapter on how patient data has informed how we think about reading. Alexia: Diagnosis, Treatment and Theory is aimed at neuropsychologists (both experimental and clinical), neurologists, speech therapists and others who deal with patients whose reading has been affected by an acquired brain injury, as well as interested students studying language disorders.

The book comprises a brief theoretical review and presents four empirical studies relating to the question of whether brain areas can be specialized for reading. This question has been studied within the broader context of cognitive neuroscience, both in patients with acquired disorders of reading (alexia), and with the use of functional imaging techniques. An important account postulates that an area in the mid-fusiform gyrus - the so-called visual word form area - is specialized for reading (in literate adults). Extant evidence for and against such specialization is briefly reviewed and found inconclusive. The reported empirical studies of patients with pure alexia, as well as a functional imaging study of word and picture recognition, challenges the notion of selectivity for word or letter processing in the visual domain. However, the findings do suggest that reading may be disproportionately affected by damage to more general purpose visual recognition processes.