Affiliations: Department of Linguistics, University of Antwerp,
Antwerp, Belgium | Department of Languages, Vrije Universiteit Brussel,
Brussels, Belgium | Department of Neurology, ZNA-Middelheim Hospital,
Antwerp, Belgium | Laboratory of Neurochemistry and Behaviour, Born-Bunge
Foundation, University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium | Department of Psychiatry, Academic Hospital, Vrije
Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium
Note: [] Corresponding author: Jo Verhoeven, MSc, PhD, University of
Antwerp, Department of Linguistics, Universiteitsplein, B-2610 Wilrijk,
Belgium. Tel.: +32 3 820 27 77; Fax: +32 3 820 27 62; E-mail:
jo.verhoeven@ua.ac.be
Abstract: Objective: The aim of this paper is to report the psychiatric,
neuroradiological and linguistic characteristics in a native speaker of Dutch
who developed speech symptoms which strongly resemble Foreign Accent Syndrome.
Background: Foreign Accent Syndrome is a rare speech
production disorder in which the speech of a patient is perceived as foreign by
speakers of the same speech community. This syndrome is generally related to
focal brain damage. Only in few reported cases the Foreign Accent Syndrome is
assumed to be of psychogenic and/or psychotic origin. Method: In addition to clinical and neuroradiological
examinations, an extensive test battery of standardized neuropsychological and
neurolinguistic investigations was carried out. Two samples of the patient's
spontaneous speech were analysed and compared to a 500,000-words reference
corpus of 160 normal native speakers of Dutch. Results: The patient had a prominent French accent in her
pronunciation of Dutch. This accent had persisted over the past eight years and
has become progressively stronger. The foreign qualities of her speech did not
only relate to pronunciation, but also to the lexicon, syntax and pragmatics.
Structural as well as functional neuroimaging did not reveal evidence that
could account for the behavioural symptoms. By contrast psychological
investigations indicated conversion disorder. Conclusions: To the best of our knowledge this is the first
reported case of a foreign accent like syndrome in conversion disorder.
