Glossary/Definitions

Glossary/Definitions of Words commonly found within the brain injury community.

Abstract Concept: A concept or idea not related to any specific instance or object and which potentially can be applied to many different situations or objects. Persons with cognitive deficits often have difficulty understanding abstract concepts.

Abstract Thinking: Being able to apply abstract concepts to new situations and surroundings.

Affective Disorders: Mental illnesses characterized mainly by abnormalities in mood. The two principal categories are mania and depression.

Agnosia: Inability to recognize a sensory stimulus. May occur in any sensory modality.

Agraphia: Inability to express thoughts in writing.

Amnesia: Lack of memory about events occurring during a particular period of time. Several varieties are relevant: Anterograde amnesia - inability to remember eventsbeginning with the onset of the injury; essentially, severly decreased ability to learn. Retrograde amnesia - loss of memory for events preceding the injury. Post-traumatic amnesia (PTA) the period of anterograde amnesia following a head injury. Unable to store new information.

Aneurysm: A balloon-like deformity in the wall of a blood vessel. The wall weakens asd the balloon grow larger, and may eventually burst, causing a hemorrhage.

Anomia: Inability to recall names of objects. Persons with this problem often can speak fluently but have to use other words to describe familiar objects.

Anosmia: Loss of the sense of smell.

Anterograde Amnesia: Inability to consolidate information about ongoing events. Difficulty with new learning.

Apathy: A lack of interest or concern.

Aphasia: Loss of the ability to express oneself and/or to understand language. Caused by damage to brain cells rather than deficits in speech or hearing organs.

Cognitive Impairment: Difficulty with one or more of the basic functions of the brain: perception, memory, attentional abilities, and reasoning skills.

Comprehension: Processing language of varying complexity, relating that information to past experiences, acting upon it appropriately. Comprehension is determined by the person's behavior.

Concrete Thinking: A style of thinking in which the individual sees each situation as unique and is unable to generalize from the similarities between situations. Language and perceptions are interpreted literally so that a proverb such as "a stitch in time saves nine" cannot be readily grasped.

Concussion: The common result of a blow to the head or sudden deceleration usually causing an altered mental state, either temporary or prolonged. Physiologic and/or anatomic disruption of connections between some nerve cells in the brain may occur. Often used by the public to refer to a brief loss of consciousness.

Confabulation: Verbalizations about people, places, and events with no basis in reality. May be a detailed account delivered.

Diffuse Axonal Injury: DNA: A shearing injury of large nerve fibers (axons covered with myelin) in many areas of the brain. It appears to be one of the two primary lesions of brain injury, the other being stretching or shearing of blood vessels from the same forces, producing hemorrhage.

Dyscalculia: Impaired ability to do arithmetic computation. May relate to a variety of more basic disorders such as confusion or deficits in perception, spatial skills, sequencing, etc. Sometimes referred to as ascalculia, which is technically a total inability to do arithmetic.

Dysgraphia:Impaired ability to write, due to motor impairment.

Diffuse Brain Injury: Injury to the cells in many areas of the brain rather than in one specific location.

Emotional Lability: Exhibiting rapid and drastic changes in emotional state (laughing, crying, anger) inappropriately without apparent reason.

Executive Functions: Planning, prioritizing, sequencing self-monitoring, self-correcting, inhibiting, initiating, controlling or altering behavior.

Frontal Lobe: Front part of the brain: involved in planning, organizing, problem solving, selective attention, personality and a variety of "higher cognitive functions".

Higher Cognitive Functions: Usually refers to judgment, abstraction, planning, problem-solving, etc.

Interpersonal Skills: The ability to relate to others in a socially appropriate, meaningful way.

Judgment: Process of forming an opinion, based upon an evaluation of the situation at hand in comparison with personal values, preferences and insights regarding expected consequences. The ability to make appropriate decisions.

Lethargic: Awakens only with stimulation: drowsy but awake.

Memory: Recording of new information. Many types of memory are distinguished, some of the more common are - registration: a very brief sensory memory function by which information enters the memory system. It is then entered into short term memory or decay and is lost. Very resistant to impairments.

Short Term Memory: Working with memory with limited capacity. Its contents are in conscious awareness. Lasts 30 seconds to several minutes.

Long Term Memory: More permanent storage of memory

Motivation: Requires initiative and refers to the extent to which an individual desires to reach a goal and demonstrates actual follow through. A greater level of motivation is required for completion of difficult tasks. A brain injured person with reduced motivation may need frequent cueing to finish dressing, even though being able to verbalize the complete procedure.

Non-ambulatory: Not able to walk.

Occipital Lobe: Region in the back of the brain which processes visual information. Damage to this lobe can cause visual deficits.

Parietal Lobe Right: Damage to this area can cause visual-spatial deficits (e.g. one may have difficulty finding their way around new or even familiar places).

Perception: The ability to make sense of what one sees, hears, feels, tastes or smells. Perceptual losses are often very subtle and sometimes we may be unaware of them.

Retrograde Amnesia: Inability to recall events that occurred prior to the accident: may be a specific span of time or type of information.

Sequencing: Reading, listening, expressing thoughts, describing events or contracting muscles in an orderly and meaningful manner.

Temporal Lobes: There are two temporal lobes, one of each side of the brain located at about the level of the ear. These lobes allow a person to tell one smell from another and one sound from another. They also help in storing information and are believed to be responsible for short-term memory. Right Lobe: Mainly involved in visual memory e.g. memory for pictures and faces. Left Lobe: Mainly involved in verbal memory (i.e. memory for words and names).

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