Pragmatic error identification in traumatic brain injury

Traumatic brain injury causes physical, neurobehavioral, and cognitive-linguistic deficits including problems related to pragmatic functioning and emotional processing. This study investigated the ability of 10 (9 male and 1 female) adults with traumatic brain injury and 10 neurotypical participants to identify errors in pragmatic behavior embedded in 25 videotaped interactions presented by computer. Statistical analysis revealed that the neurotypical participants identified significantly more violations of pragmatic rules than the participants with traumatic brain injury for two of the five deficit categories, excessive interruption and two deficits. Limitations of the study and directions for future research are discussed.