Contribution from neuropsychology to the study of semantic memory

Abstract

Semantic memory has been studied from various fields. The first models emerged from cognitive psychology from the hand of the division proposed by Tulving between semantic and episodic memory. Over the past thirty years there have been parallel developments in the fields of psycholinguistics, cognitive psychology and cognitive neuropsychology. The present work is to review the contributions that have emerged within the neuropsychology to the study of semantic memory and to present an updated overview of the points of consensus. First, it is defined the term "semantics" conceptually within the field of neuropsychology. Then, there is a dichotomy that passes through both psychological and neuropsychological models on semantic memory: the existence of modals versus amodal representations. Third, there are  developed the main theoretical models in neuropsychology that emerged in an attempt to explain categoryspecific semantic deficits. Finally, more robust contributions and points that still generate some discussion are reviewed.