Document Type

Peer-Reviewed Article

Semester of Graduation

Spring 2026

Abstract

Background: Despite the importance of grammatical skills for participation
in daily life, treatments for sentence–level abilities in aphasia
are comparatively scarce. The psycholinguistic paradigm of syntactic
priming has recently been advanced as a potential assessment and
treatment for grammatical skills, and existing evidence on priming in
aphasia is highly promising. Nevertheless, a comprehensive analysis of
the strength of priming effects in aphasia, as well as treatment components
which might amplify these effects, has not been reported.
This meta–analysis synthesizes existing findings on syntactic priming
in aphasia, aiming to provide a comprehensive picture of priming
effects and their potential application for treatment.

Method: A comprehensive search of reported syntactic priming
studies including persons with aphasia was conducted, yielding
27 experiments. Standardized mean differences (SMD) were computed
from each experiment to account for inter –study heterogeneity.
Studies were then weighted by participant numbers. An
omnibus meta–analysis model was fitted to evaluate standardized
differences associated with priming, followed by meta–regression
analyses assessing possible treatment components.
Results: A large, robust effect of syntactic priming was discovered
(SMD = 1.37). All but one reported studies found positive priming
effects, though substantial heterogeneity was found between included
experiments. Meta–regression analyses found no effects of lexical overlap
between primes and targets (lexical boost), the presence of
a confederate in experiments, or oral repetition of prime sentences.

Conclusions: This study strongly supports the development of
syntactic priming as a sentence–level treatment in aphasia, and
suggests high adaptability of priming to different formats and
settings. Lexical overlap may not be effective in facilitating priming–induced
gains. Future studies of priming in aphasia should
include larger samples of participants and should investigate how
lexical information interacts with syntactic priming.

Awardee Name

Ally Miller

Academic Major

Communication Disorders & Communication Studies

Project Mentor

Willem van Boxtel

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