Five severe aphasics (including total aphasics) were investigated on auditory and reading comprehension of common nouns, place names, person's names.
    The results were similar to those reported by Wapner (1979) that total aphasics could comprehend place names better than common nouns. In addition, we found that severe aphasics were likely to understand person's names better than place names. furthermore, reading comprehension were better than auditory comprehension.
    We postulated that as person's and place names were included in proper name which was less meaningful than common nouns : therefore severe aphasics with problem in decoding meaning could comprehend the proper name easily.

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     Pathogenesis of developmental stuttering is controversial. We have presented two interesting cases of stuttering and discussed the factors of stuttering.
    Case 1. A 53-year-old right handed male had developmental stuttering. In October, 1985, he developed left putaminal hemorrhage with right hemiparesis and Wernicke's aphasia. He did not stutter, while he had poor auditory comprehension and neglected his illness. But when his auditory comprehension was improved, his stuttering reappeared.
    Case 2. A 46-year-old right handed male had developmental stuttering. In February, 1984, he had left putaminal hemorrhage with Broca's aphasia and right hemiparesis. His auditory comprehension and awareness of his illness were not disturbed, and his stuttering did not disappear.
    The cerebral dominant theory (Orton and Travis' theory) alone cannot explain these cases of stuttering. If their cerebral dominancy had not been established, left putaminal hemorrhage might not have caused typical aphasia. We emphasize that the auditory comprehension and awareness of his illness -- monitoring system of speech -- is one of the most important factors of stuttering.

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     Each of 16 aphasics took a comprehension test that was devised from the Token Test. Every patient was asked to follow the directions which were given by synthetic speech sounds with three different conditions. In the first condition, the directions were given at the rate of 4.6 syllables per second. In the second condition, the directions were given at the rate of 2.4 syllables per second, and between these syllables the silent intervals were inserted. In the third condition, the directions were given at the rate of 2.4 syllables persecond, and the vowel component of each syllable was prolonged.
    The ratio of correct performances was the highest in the third condition, and the lowest in the first condition.
    The results indicate that presentation with slower rate contributes to comprehensibility, and the length of vowel duration and ⁄ or the silent intervals between syllables may affect auditory comprehension of aphasic patients.

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